When faced with the chance to take a year off from school to train alongside the United States women’s senior national water polo team, a pipeline to the Olympics, goalkeeper Sami Hill jumped at the opportunity.
But the usually vocal leader of UCLA’s team, when immersed in the national level amid intimidating players, quickly found herself nervous and silent – in the same position as many of UCLA’s new players earlier this season.
“When I was training, I was kind of the youngest one, coming in new and learning from all these girls that have been playing since before I was born – they’re old, so they’ve been playing forever – so when I was training I was trying to soak it in, learning everything I could, so when I came back I could give it to my team,” the redshirt sophomore said.
The goalkeeper’s development as a leader through her national training was extremely useful coming into this season, considering the relative youth of UCLA’s team, a team that needed some growth with eight freshmen on the roster.
In light of the challenges of last year’s national team training, Hill had much in common with the young players on UCLA’s team.
For starters, Hill didn’t know any of the players she trained with on the national team and said she was initially nervous – even scared.
In Hill’s situation, some of the players had been through two Olympics, meaning they had practiced at least eight years together, leaving Hill to practice without the comfort of her close-knit college team environment.
“I just was quiet at all times, I listened, I didn’t speak. I didn’t really have a leading role in that team, but I took a role as a sponge and tried not to get down on myself,” Hill said. “If they told me something I did wrong, I had to turn around and learn and do it right the next time. I tried to stay on people’s good sides. I didn’t want to be not liked.”
Hill’s younger sister, freshman attacker Kodi Hill, who also plays on UCLA’s team, attested to the burden her sister faced in training for a period with the senior team.
“(Sami) obviously had to take the year off of school last year and it’s a lot of work. It’s every day training, twice a day,” said Kodi Hill, who is trying out for the junior national team.
“Once they invite you to the senior level it gets a lot more intense, you have to be really committed. And it’s really hard, the trainings are really difficult and taxing on you.”
But when Sami Hill returned to the international scene earlier this month, she knew what to expect. This time around, the stakes are higher – rather than simply practicing with the national team, Hill began training and trying out for the senior team soon after her college season ended in early May in the NCAA semifinals.
The summer journey will involve multiple training camps, various international games and, under the leadership of former UCLA water polo coach Adam Krikorian, a “whittling down” process to narrow the team to about 15 players who will compete in Barcelona for the World Championships in July, and eventually, the Olympics.
Hill is excited about the singular focus that training with the national team brings.
“It was long training (with the national team), but it didn’t feel long. Sometimes college training feels long, but that didn’t feel long, just because I could focus only on water polo and I didn’t have homework,” Hill said. “Here (at UCLA) I have to focus in practice and go home and do homework and I’m just tired all the time. It’s different.”
Despite the quicker pace of practices, however, trying out for the senior team, the group that will eventually become the 2016 Olympic squad, isn’t easy. Hill recalled that although competition with the other players wasn’t overly demanding compared to UCLA’s, certain aspects of practice were.
“Lifting was hard. Lifting was really hard for me. Weights were terrible. Because we ran a lot and did a lot of pull-ups – which, I can’t even do one pull-up – and we did a lot of that stuff,” Hill said.
The intensity of practice stems from the fact that swimming isn’t the main focus of the team, said sophomore attacker Emily Donohoe, who is also trying out for the junior team.
“(Unlike college practices) there’s not much swimming because you’re kind of already expected to be in that sort of shape and at that time it’s just really quick. You have to learn all the different systems so that we’re all ready to play together the following week,” Donohoe said.
The strenuous nature of national training, Hill notes, has helped her grow as a player. But besides helping her with her Olympic aspirations, Hill ultimately hopes that her training will continue to benefit the young UCLA women’s water polo team, a team that grew tremendously this past season in spite of an NCAA semifinal loss to Stanford.
And although devotion to Monday-through-Saturday national team practices this summer will take her away from most of UCLA’s summer practices, Hill is confident in the growth of her team after this season.
“I tried to make myself a more developed player for my team,” Hill said. “Now we kind of know our roles and our place, so I’m really excited. It was a long road, but I think we did well.”