After winning a Sac-Joaquin Section championship last year the Merced High boys water polo team enters this season with even bigger goals. The Bears would like to add a NorCal championship plaque to their list of trophies.

 

Merced started the season on Wednesday evening in impressive fashion, defeating Turlock 18-8 at Merced High School. Kade Slocum scored seven goals and Cord McCall added five goals, five assists and six steals. The Bears jumped out to a 7-0 lead by the end of the first quarter and were able to cruise to the victory.

 

Our motto this year is going to be ‘Set the tone,’ and that first quarter coming out and playing the way we did, we set the tone,” said Bears coach Eric Larson. Slocum started the scoring with a goal with 5:38 left in the first quarter. Hunter Gossett, Clayton Drury and McCall followed with goals. Slocum found the net three times in the first quarter to help the Bears open the 7-0 lead.

 

“Our connection as a team is great,” Slocum said. “All of us together, we just have such great chemistry, and then our defense is really just on point. Our offense is just tough to stop with our counters.”

 

McCall says the team hasn’t lost the hunger after winning the blue banner last year. “We’re excited, we want to win back-to-back,” McCall said. “We’re ready to go. Hopefully we can win again this year and eventually move up to D-1.”

 

Six different Merced players scored goals and just as importantly six different players recorded at least two steals. Gossett says one area this team excels in is communication, especially on the defensive end. “I think this group has a better understanding of communication overall, especially with the little things,” Gossett said. “We work really well, if someone says to come back and help, there's no second thoughts, you just come back and help.”

 

McCall, Gossett and Slocum all three key returning players from last year’s team that finished 30-3. Larson says McCall and Gossett both played big roles on last year’s team. He says Slocum will play a much bigger role as a sophomore this year on offense and defense. The Bears also return junior goalie Eli Morison, senior Gavin Cooper, junior Nathan Larson, sophomore Mitchell Metcalf and senior Matthew Hamilton. Freshmen Andrew Hamilton and Drury will also contribute.

 

“They don't care who scores the ball as long as it's in the back of the net and they win,” said Eric Larson. “They've been wanting to do this since they were little kids and now they get to do that.” 

 

Shawn Jansen is the MUHSD Program Manager Digital Media. He can be reached at Sjansen@muhsd.org.