a drunken backyard pool party gone horribly wrong

U.S. women's water polo team overcomes coach's gaffe in win

Dave D’Alessandro: ddalessandro@starledger.com

They love to play the game. We suspect that you don’t have to be insane to play it, but it can’t hurt. It’s one of the most exhausting, heart-bursting activities we’ve seen this week — it’s there with beach volleyball, Greco Roman wrestling, and judo — but they love it and play it well.

If you’re not attuned to nuance, it looks like a drunken backyard pool party gone horribly wrong. But it has elements of lacrosse and soccer and basketball — picture team handball in a 6-foot pool — and these are the most stout women you’ll ever see. It is physical, it is occasionally mayhem, especially when the girl with the ball invariably disappears under the water line with an audible glug-glug.

Synchronized drowning, that. Sometimes the aggrieved party gets a whistle from the two refs strolling the sidelines. But for all the pounding and grabbing and scratching and finger bending, the most common cause of these gurgles are some defender surreptitiously yanking on an opponent’s full-body suit, and tugging her under.

“It’s different every game you watch,” said U.S. goalie Betsey Armstrong. “I’m the goalie so I don’t get the brunt of it, but my teammates might come out of the water with some rips.”

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