Over the weekend, the Macalester Scots women’s water polo team competed in the USA Water Polo Division III Collegiate National Championship, hosted by the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Colleges (CMS) in Claremont, Calif. On April 25, Macalester faced off against Pomona-Pitzer Colleges, the defending national champions, and lost after a hard-fought match. But the Scots rebounded the next day, winning the third-place match in a conference championship rematch against Carthage College.
The Scots secured their bid to nationals by winning their conference, the Collegiate Water Polo Association (CWPA), on April 12, clinching the title with a 14-9 victory against Carthage and marking Macalester’s first CWPA title since 2019. The top two CWPA schools faced off against the top two from the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) in a four-way bracket for the championship.
“Our team goal for the year was to win the CWPA, so nationals was just a bonus,” attacker Katie Martin ’29 said.
Despite this, Martin said the team was pumped up heading into the competition. Utility player Jess Palmer-Sammons ’26 said her team has been fighting for a place at nationals her whole time at Macalester, making their journey all the more meaningful.
“We have been working so hard to get to nationals the past three years,” she said. “We felt privileged to have the opportunity to play the SCIAC schools. … Our mindset going in was that we have nothing to lose, and they would have everything to lose.”
Macalester’s first game of the weekend was a match against the Pomona-Pitzer The Sagehens played a 35-game schedule coming into nationals, compared to Macalester’s 20. At the time, they were winners of four straight national championships. The Scots knew they had a formidable opponent.
Macalester had a glimmer of hope, though: the week before the tournament, Pomona-Pitzer lost to the Claremont-MuddScripps Athenas in the SCIAC Championships. It was a shocking upset, as CMS won for just the fourth time in 35 games against the ’hens.
“Both CMS and Pomona-Pitzer have scrimmaged and beaten D-I schools in the past, so we knew we had a challenge,” said Palmer-Sammons.
The game was a bitter challenge against a top-caliber team. Sagehens.
“I think the Pomona game started with nerves and we struggled to find our groove against them,” Martin said.
At the halfway mark of the match, the score was 12-0 in favor of the Sagehens. In the third quarter, Anna Gaisser ’28 scored one of Mac’s two goals. Later that quarter, PalmerSammons followed up with a goal of her own, but it was too little, too late, as the final score of the game was 23-2.
“We didn’t have the game that we wanted to have, but there was still joy in the small moments of the game,” Martin said.
“It felt good to get some goals in and avoid having the game be [a] shutout,” Palmer-Sammons added.
Defeated but not deflated, the Scots channeled their energy into their game the next day, a matchup against the Carthage Firebirds for third place. This game was the fourth Scots-Firebirds faceoff of the season; the teams faced each other only two weeks prior in the CWPA title game.
“Since we have played Carthage in the past, we knew how aggressive and hard they come into the game,” Palmer-Sammons said. “Due to this, we knew we could not settle. We would have to fight for the win no matter what.”
That game also started off slow for Macalester, with the score at 2-0 after the first quarter. Although attacker Alana Nadolski ’26 scored in the second quarter, Carthage powered ahead with goals of its own, bringing the score to 5-1 entering the fourth.
Nadolski and Gaisser replied with goals of their own, bringing the score to 5-3. Gaisser and Palmer-Sammons added another pair to tie it up. One goal each came from Nadolski and Martin, bringing Macalester a lead of two with 2:14 left on the clock.
But the game wasn’t over.
“After I scored, we were still only up by two points with multiple possessions left to play, and we knew Carthage was going to fight every second,” Martin said.
Fight they did, as Carthage converted on a shot to whittle the Scots’ lead down to one.
“On their last possession of the game, they gained a man-up advantage on us,” Martin said. “It wasn’t until we shut down the 6-5 [six players to five] and gained possession of the ball with less than 30 seconds left did I realize that we were going to win.”
The secret to their win, Martin said, was the support from the sidelines.
“I think our crowd of parents had a big effect,” she said. “They were like the seventh player in the pool.”
Two Macalester players, Nadolski and goalkeeper Jayden Kratt ’26, were named to the All-Tournament Team.
For Palmer-Sammons, regardless of the outcome, this end to the season was a great way to cap off her Macalester career.
“I felt ecstatic,” she said of qualifying for nationals. “We wanted to go in, energy high, and play the best we could.”
