Gig Harbor’s Ponce, Lott named to All-American water polo team yet again

Gig Harbor High School 2017 grads Alana Ponce and Olivia Lott have once again been named to the NISCA water polo All-American team.

Ponce, who has been named to the All-American team all four years of her high school career, was named to this year’s first-team. It’s Lott’s second time on the team, and she was named to this year’s third team, after being a fourth-team selection a year ago.

There are 100 athletes from the entire country selected to the All-American team. For the dynamic duo, it’s par for the course.

Ponce, a goal-scorer in the pool, has been a star for the Gig Harbor Tides since she stepped onto campus four years ago. She has been named to the first-team the past two years.

“Freshman and sophomore year, I was on the second or third team,” Ponce said. “It was kind of a buildup. Getting named to the first team the last two years was a really big goal and a big deal for me.”

Gig Harbor coach Mike Kelly surprised Ponce with the news at a Narrows Water Polo club practice last week. Ponce is headed to George Washington University in Washington, D.C. next year to continue her academic and water polo career.

Lott, a goalie who in the fall is headed to Azusa Pacific University near Los Angeles was thrilled to crack into the third team this year.

“It was kind of unexpected,” Lott said. “I was super excited. I thought getting on the fourth team was really good. I didn’t think I’d do any better this year. I thought I’d maybe be on the fourth team again. So I was pretty excited.”

Ponce and Lott will be in a somewhat strange situation next year of not playing on the same team anymore. The pair have headlined the Gig Harbor water polo program for several years.

“It’s really sad,” Lott said. “She’s one of my best friends, too. It’ll be really different not having her on my team, talking to her at halftime and being able to rely on her as a strong player.”

Despite the distance between Ponce and Lott’s future colleges — 2,648 miles, to be exact — they’ll actually have the opportunity to play against each other next season. George Washington and Azusa Pacific are both scheduled to play in the same tournament in the spring in Southern California.

“We’ll have to see how the team plays — hopefully I’ll block a few of (Ponce’s) shots,” Lott said, with a laugh.

They’ll be teammates together at least one more time, though, before they head off to college. Both will be playing for the Narrows Water Polo club’s 18U team in the Junior Olympics later this month in Orange County, California.

“I expect us to definitely be pushed to work together as a team really well,” Ponce said. “It’s going to be a really hard weekend.”

The tournament features some of the top schools in water polo hotbed California, as well as other top teams from across the country. The Narrows 18U and 16U teams will face an uphill battle in some games.

“We always go down there mostly to learn,” Lott said. “You’re surrounded by the best teams in America. Some travel internationally. It’s a big tournament. For us, coming from Washington, we go there to learn and experience and watch a lot of other teams play that are better than us and we embrace the experience.”

Ponce was blunt in her assessment of the tournament’s talent.

“Some of the teams will probably crush us,” Ponce said. “But we’ll learn a lot. I think we’ll win a couple games and definitely learn a lot from those really good teams.”

This story was originally published July 24, 2017 at 10:01 AM with the headline "Gig Harbor’s Ponce, Lott named to All-American water polo team yet again."