FratHouseSports

Ranked #1 in the preseason and the first two polls of the regular season, the Cardinal clinched a unanimous spot on top of the poll by going 4-0 against teams ranked in the top 10 and winning their own tournament this past weekend. Stanford started off by dusting #8 ASU (10-1 W), then disposed of #3 Cal (10-5 W), then cruised past #9 San Jose State (16-4 W), before beating #2 USC 10-9 in sudden death overtime.

Even with the loss USC remains #2, while UCLA (who went 3-1 in that same tournament, with that loss coming to USC) jumped Cal to take over the three spot. But other than that 3-4 flipflop, top 20 remains the same as last week. The complete top 20 here.

(from l-r) 1. Stanford  2. USC  3. Cal 4. UCLA  5. Hawaii

Somehow water polo season has snuck up on us and here goes the first rankings of the year. We’re a little too late to give you a recap of last weeks action, but nothing of importance has happened anyways…all the teams have just been playing cupcake games and the entire top 10 remains unchanged from the preseason rankings.

But hold onto your knickers because shts about to get real this weekend at the Stanford Invitational…all five of the top teams will be there plus three more top 15 teams.

As promised here go pictures of almost all the girls featured in the 2010 ESPN Magazine Body Issue: The US Women’s Water Polo Team, WNBA player Diana Taurasi, wheelchair tennis player Ester Vergeer, pool player Jeanette Lee, Olympic skier Julia Mancuso, volleyball player Kim Glass, and Javelin thrower Rachel Yurkovich (who went to Oregon).

We’re still working on getting a couple more shots, but these will more than do for now.

Big Pictures Of All The Ladies Below…

Unlike school, the college sports season continues well on into the summer. But with the conclusion of the baseball season yesterday it is officially over! In all 33 championships were handed out in 22 different sports and I don’t even want to think about all the individual championships given out in sports like track, wrestling, fencing, swimming, and stuff. What I’ll remember most from it and what you should remember most too below.

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The past three seasons, the Women of Troy have been one of the most dominant water polo teams in the nation, entering the NCAA tournament ranked first, second and third in the country, respectively. Never winning less than 19 games each year.

Three consecutive years, three consecutive top-three finishes, but zero titles. The past 3 years their title dreams were ended by crosstown rival UCLA, who had won the last five national championships. But this year with UCLA not in the way it was the Trojans time.

For the fist time since 2004 the Women of Troy claimed the NCAA National Championship by beating the Stanford Cardinal, a team they had lot to twice this season in an ESPN Instant Classic 10-9. It is the programs third title and schools 112th overall.

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The first two rounds might not have went 100% as I thought they would, but I got the end result right…in the NCAA Women’s Water Polo title game it will be a battle between the two beat teams, #1 Stanford against #2 USC. This will be USC’s third straight trip to the NCAA finals and this time they won’t have to worry about UCLA getting in their way.

But they will have the Cardinal who have given them plenty of problems this year. The two teams have already met three times this season…Stanford won the first match 10-7, USC took the second 10-6, and Stanford the last on April 24 by a score of 7-6 in overtime. This one should be a good one, the game starts at 8:00 ET on CBS College Sports.

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If you would have asked me two weeks ago who I thought would be playing for the women’s water polo championship this Sunday, then I would have said without hesitation USC and Stanford. They were the two most dominant teams all season, beating everyone they played and all the teams in the top 10…their only losses coming to one another.

But after both USC and Stanford lost to UCLA last weekend as the Bruins took home the MPSF Tournament title, I feel as though anybody can win this weekend.

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