9/16/2003 - Men's Water Polo
Navy Water Polo to Face Johns Hopkins and George Washington on the Road Wednesday

Senior Paul Kepner and the Mids will hit the road Wednesday to take on Johns Hopkins and George Washington.

ANNAPOLIS, Md. - The Navy water polo team will play a pair of Collegiate Water Polo Association (CWPA) league games Wednesday afternoon against Johns Hopkins and George Washington. The Mids will face the Bluejays in Baltimore, Md., at 4:30 p.m. followed by a 7:30 p.m. game against the Colonials.

Navy is off to a 7-1 start and has won seven-straight games heading into Wednesday's doubleheader.

"These are our first-two league games of the year, and it's important for us to play well and get off to a good start," Navy head coach Mike Schofield said. "Both Johns Hopkins and George Washington have improved significantly and are capable of beating us."

The Mids opened the season with the Navy Open (Sept. 6-7) and registered a 3-1 mark, falling only to Queens in their season opener. Last weekend at the North-South Tournament in Princeton, N.J., Navy reeled off four victories by a combined seven goals.

One of Navy's wins included a 9-6 victory against service-academy rival Air Force. The Falcons trimmed the Mids' three-goal lead to one late in the game before Navy seniors Joe Donahue (Annapolis, Md.) and Tim Fox (La Jolla, Calif.) each scored in the closing minutes to ice the victory. Donhue and Fox led the team with three goals apiece, while Patrick Rollo (Jr./Palos Verdes, Calif.) netted two scores. Navy goalie Patrick McCreary (So./Edgewater, Md.) made five blocks in the cage.

With the win over Air Force, Navy pushed its all-time record to 13-6 against the Falcons and has won three-straight, including four of the last-five meetings.

"I didn't realize our record against Air Force was quite that good," Schofield said. "We need to keep working hard with our recruiting because they are really stepping it up and doing a good job."

Donahue continues to lead Navy with a team-high 20 goals and 12 steals. Fox is second in scoring with 14 goals and has tallied two assists with four steals. Alex Ratcliffe has been steady, posting seven goals, seven assists and 10 steals. In the cage, McCreary has blocked 51 percent of the shots he's faced to go with 12 steals.