Gannon University water polo coach Don Sherman, and his son, sophomore Cody Sherman think otherwise.

Both being a part of the men’s water polo team, Don and Cody have created a stronger relationship than they had before.

“We have always been close,” Don said. “But if it wasn’t for practice, I don’t think I would ever see him.”

Having your father as your coach is not always the easiest situation when being on a competitive team. But for the men’s water polo team at Gannon this situation is not an issue.

“We are all very close,” Cody said. “It is like they are all my brothers.”

For any student being away from home, having to deal with the change is hard. Luckily for Cody and the rest of the men on the team the pool is their new home, and the team is the family. Don Sherman makes everybody on the team equal in importance. “It is like he is everybody’s dad,” Cody says with pride.

Don Sherman played water polo for eight years and has been coaching the Gannon team since he opened the department in 1999. He knows firsthand what it takes to be successful in this sport and any sport for that matter.

As associate director of athletics at Gannon, he gets to see the academic achievements and athletic achievements each student athlete at Gannon accomplishes.

“I love the small town community,” Don Sherman said. “I have gotten to watch it change.”

Cody agreed.

“I like the community feel,” he said. “Especially between the other athletes.”

With limited space for teams at Gannon, all of the teams need to cooperate.

“The entire water polo team knows all the swimmers,” Cody said. “We are all very close.”

Don Sherman is not only the coach of the men’s water polo team, he is the women’s water polo coach as well. “You need to have a different approach” he said. “They both have different styles of play, but both work just as hard.”

The men’s waterpolo team finished second during the Colligate Water Polo Association (CWPA) Division II Eastern Championship over the weekend. Standing with an 8-8 record, Gannon is preparing for the CWPA Souther Division II Championships Friday through Sunday at Bucknell Univeristy.

Cody Sherman, a McDowell High School graduate, first started playing water polo in the sixth grade and became truly passionate by the eighth grade.

In high school, he had difficulty choosing between football and water polo before it became clear.

“They told me how much fun it was to play waterpolo,” Cody said. “Some of them are now my teammates here at Gannon.”

As a college student, he now has more obligations.

“It’s hard not to fall asleep after 5 a.m. practices,” Cody said.

The Sherman family has been a part of the Gannon community for years. With Don being an active member of the athletic department for 13 years, and with his two daughters also attending, it made it easy for Cody.

When it’s game time for the Knights, it is not just a couple fans in the stands, it is sometimes the whole Sherman clan.

“Sometimes you see my mom, Cody’s mom and his sisters,” Don said. “They are huge supporters.”

This year has posed different problems, as injuries have taken their toll on the Knights.

“It isn’t the battle this year as it usually is,” Cody said. “Due to the injuries everyone plays.”

Gannon is coming off a 14-12 win over Notre Dame (Ohio) College and a 18-5 loss to Mercyhurst University at the Division II Saturday.

BECKY HILKER

Hilker001@knights.gannon.edu

The win over their hometown rival boosted the Knights to a ninth-place finish at the tournament and a final record of 8-17.

The win that was generated by an offensive explosion came after two tough losses to Johns Hopkins University and George Washington University Saturday.

Both the Blue Jays and the Cardinals jumped out to quick leads against the Knights, though junior goalkeeper Neal Zoellick did a solid job on defense, totaling 22 saves in two matches.

Gannon contrastingly could not match the offensive efforts of either opponent, netting only three goals in each match.

It was a completely different story against Penn State Behrend, as the Knights outscored the Lions in all four quarters. The team was led by sophomore Daisuke Takagi, who finished the match with five goals. Seniors Phil Myrick and Greg Nelson followed closely behind, each scoring four times.

Myrick said the team’s problem on Saturday was getting off to a slow start in each game.

“Against Johns Hopkins and GW we started off slow and couldn’t seem to find any sort of groove during both games,” he said. “We just lacked focus – usually we figure things out by the second half but it wasn’t until the last three minutes of each game that we started to play as a cohesive team.”

He said that against Behrend, the team turned around its habit of sluggish starts with a goal almost right out of the gate.

“We scored within the first 10 seconds and from then on out we were unstoppable,” he said. “Everything fell into place like we have practiced all year and we really seemed to find our style of play. Too bad it was in our last game.”

Zoellick again pulled through for the Knights in goal, racking up 11 saves against the Lions.

Both Nelson and Myrick said the major thing that held the team back from finishing with a better record was a young team that lacked a certain amount of experience, but that they improved vastly with each match.

“I thought we had a lot of ups and downs,” Myrick said. “Being a young team, things can be difficult at times.”

Nelson also said that though the team was young, the Knights were extremely talented.

“We had a great season and gave it 100 percent all the time,” he said. “It was fun and I had the best senior year I could have asked for.”

Myrick also said that he predicts although he will not be around next year, the Knights will have a successful season.

“After every loss we gained the right experience that’s necessary to have a strong and adaptive team,” he said. “I am really excited to see where the team goes next year and I have a feeling it will be their best finishing season yet.”

CHRISTINE PEFFER

peffer002@knights.gannon.edu

Takagi’s story began with his birth in Tokyo. He moved twice more after this, first in 1991 to the Mie Prefecture and then in 2001 to Tsukuba, which is where his family still lives today and where he began his water polo career. Takagi’s family was not unfamiliar with water polo before Takagi began playing.

His father, Hideki Takagi, played goalie for the University of Tsukuba for four years and competed for the intercollegiate water polo championship all four years. Three years after his career ended, he became the coach of the Tsukuba team.

Eventually, he became the coach of the Japan national water polo team, which competed at the 2011 FINA World Championships, and he hopes to compete for a coaching job on the Japanese Olympic water polo team in the future.

During his sixth-grade year, his father convinced him to focus on water polo over baseball and he was able to play for Daisuke Kobayashi, who Takagi considered his most influential coach.

“He taught me the fundamentals of water polo,” he said. “Like how to use my legs and the basics of the game.”

Takagi said the main reason he has stuck with the sport so long is the camaraderie he has developed.

Before coming to Gannon, Takagi joined a club water polo team sponsored by Bourbon, one of Japan’s leading food and beverage producers.

Takagi played for this team for the rest of his middle and high school careers, primarily as a substitute alongside some of the best water polo players in Japan.

His team went on to take third place at the Japan national water polo tournament, but Takagi said that the best part of playing for the team was “the free snack foods that Bourbon supplied us.”

Takagi’s decision to come to Gannon would take him over 9,000 miles before he came to reside in Erie, Pa. Takagi said he was primarily influenced by Gannon’s small size and reputation as a nationally accredited university, but that water polo was a close second in his decision.

This decision would bring Takagi into an entirely different world and separate him from his family for extended periods of time. He is only able to talk to his family once or twice a week and is only able to go home once during the school year, during Christmas break. Instead of going home for other breaks, Takagi said he typically will go home with a teammate.

Adjusting to the United States culture has taken time for him, he said. One example of this is the lack of personal space that is normally granted in Japanese culture not being as common in America, where high fives and man-hugs are a cornerstone of greeting one another.

Takagi has also had to continue to develop his knowledge of the English language, which he started learning in seventh grade but said he still struggles with from time to time. None of this has discouraged Takagi, who said he is learning to like living in the United States more with every passing day and says that the friendliness he encounters in America is pleasant.

Ever since Takagi came to the Gannon water polo team, he has been one of its brightest stars. In 2010, he ranked third on the team with 34 goals on 67 shots, while also leading the team in earned kick-outs, and finishing second in steals and third in assists. Takagi was named a Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference scholar athlete, was awarded the Collegiate Water Polo Association Southern Division Rookie-of-the-Week, and selected to be one of the players on the Division II Eastern Championship All-Tournament team.

So far this year, Takagi is again one of the team leaders with 28 goals and is also one of the statistical leaders in assists and earned kick-outs. He said he feels that passing is the best skill in his repertoire, since he enjoys setting up his teammates for scores more than scoring himself.

Takagi said he is able to be successful because of his experiences with coach Don Sherman’s system and his offseason workouts and play with his club team.

While the team has had its ups and downs this year with a 5-7 record, Takagi said this could be in part due to the fact that 10 of the 15 members on the team are freshmen and sophomores and that the lack of experience is a big factor in Gannon’s recent struggles.

He said another factor in some of Gannon’s early struggles stems from too much individual play and too little team play. He said he feels that their team play is improving, however, shown in their two wins Friday and Saturday over Salem International and Penn State-Behrend.

Quick to sing the praises of a teammate, Takagi also said that sophomore Tommy Nimrod is another young player on the rise.

“He leads the team by the way he plays,” he said.

Takagi said he feels that, with the team developing chemistry and melding into a more cohesive unit, it is an obtainable goal to finish above 50 percent. He said he wants to contribute most by continuing to be a facilitator.

With a “continued commitment to hard work and team,” Takagi said that Gannon water polo has a bright future and with leaders like him, there is no telling how successful this team can be.

NIKLAUS KIRSCHNER

kirschne001@gannon.edu

After its second loss to Notre Dame in the past two weeks, the team’s season record dropped to a disappointing 1-6 as the Falcons of Notre Dame swept all three of their matches on Friday and Saturday.

This was the Knights’ second straight loss by a one point margin. They dropped a tough loss to Washington & Jefferson University a week earlier on Sept. 11 by a score of 11-10.

Neither team opened up a lead of greater than three goals until the fourth quarter. Gannon was leading Notre Dame by a score of 9-7 heading into that final quarter of the match. Two quick goals by redshirt sophomore Daisuke Takagi and freshman Nathan Bean put the Knights up 11-7 and should have cemented the victory.

However, the Knights failed to hold on to the momentum as Notre Dame went on to score five unanswered goals in the final six minutes, with the heartbreaking game winner coming just 20 seconds before time expired.

Takagi was Gannon’s leading scorer with one goal in each quarter for a total of four. Takagi is the team’s leading scorer through seven matches.

Also netting goals for the Knights were Bean with three and redshirt sophomore Tommy Nimrod with two. Junior goalkeeper Neal Zoellick led the team’s defense with six blocks and two steals.

Nimrod said he attributes some aspects of Gannon’s recent slump to inexperience, but said that he is confident the team will be able to turn things around in its upcoming matches.

“We’re a young team and experience is a pretty big factor,” he said. “This weekend we learned a couple things that will really help us through the remainder of the season and hopefully we can improve our season record.”

The Knights will look to do just that and avenge their loss to Washington & Jefferson as they hit the road Friday for their 7:30 p.m. match.

Washington & Jefferson carries a 2-4 record into the contest.

CHRISTINE PEFFER

peffer002@gannon.edu

After giving up early goals in all of their matches, the Knights were never able to regain the momentum or the lead. In its final match, Gannon outscored Diablo Valley in both the third and fourth quarters but could not overcome the deficit and lost by a score of 13-6. Senior Phil Myrick said that digging an early hole seemed to be a recurring theme that plagued the team throughout the tournament.

“We just lacked awareness in the first half of the games and by the time we figured out what we needed to do, the clock ran out,” he said.

Leading goal scorers on the weekend for the Knights were junior Daisuke Takagi with nine and freshman Max Herath with four. Last season, Takagi was third on the team in scoring and was selected to the Division II Eastern Championship All-Tournament team.

Neal Zoellick returned as starting goalkeeper for the Knights and posted over 20 blocks, stemming the barrage of offense they withstood from their opponents throughout the tournament.

The team will look to turn things around Friday in its first conference match of the season at Mercyhurst, and on Saturday and Sunday in its first home matches of the season against Notre Dame College, Penn State Behrend and Washington & Jefferson.

CHRISTINE PEFFER

peffer002@gannon.edu

(Zack McDermott) Junior Phil Myrick (14) battles for the ball during the water polo team's Oct. 1 match against Mercyhurst College. Since that contest, the Knights have gone 4-3 to round out their season at 8-8

The Knights went 1-3 on the trip, splitting a pair of games at the Eastern Championship in Flushing, N.Y., and dropping matches to Iona College and Fordham University Sunday to fall to 8-8 on the season.

Gannon started the Eastern Championship against cross-town rival Mercyhurst College, the first game action the Knights have seen since Oct. 3. 

The Lakers defeated Gannon for the third time this season, felling the Knights 14-6 after scoring nine goals in the second half.  Freshman Gio Martino led Gannon with four of the team’s six goals. Fellow freshmen Daisuke Takagi and Marc Krolikiewicz added goals in the match.

The Knights faced off against Salem International for the second match of the Eastern Championship. Gannon used a balanced offense to defeat Salem, as seven different Knights scored in the 12-2 victory.  Senior David Landry led the attack with three goals.

Gannon traveled to New York City the next day to take on Iona and Fordham. The Knights took a 6-1 advantage against Iona after the first quarter, but were unable to hold onto the early lead. 

Iona netted nine scores over the second and third quarters to tie the match heading into the final frame. The Gaels took the fourth by a 2-1 score, defeating the Knights by a 12-11 margin.  Takagi and Martino led the Knights with three goals apiece.

The Knights fell behind early to Fordham in the team’s second match of the day.  After holding a 6-2 advantage, Fordham held off a Knights’ rally to defeat Gannon 11-9.  Greg Naranjo, the leading scorer for the Knights this season, notched four goals on the match.

Gannon will return to action when the Knights travel to Annapolis, Md., for the Collegiate Water Polo Association Southern Division Championship starting Nov. 5.

ALEX BIELER

bieler001@gannon.edu

Over the two-day event the Knights battled the likes of the United States Naval Academy, Bucknell University, Lindenwood University and John Hopkins University.

Gannon’s first match of the season was against the host school United States Naval Academy Saturday. The midshipmen, who are ranked 14^th in the Collegiate Water Polo Association, easily overcame the Knights as they were able to jump out to a 10-0 lead at halftime.

Led by senior Greg Naranjo, the Knights were able to score eight goals in the second half on the Naval Academy.  Sophomore Daisuke Takagi along with freshmen Tytus Kwiatkowski and Marc Krolikiewicz also chipped in on the scoreboard for Gannon.

Little went right for the Knights in their later meet Saturday as they were defeated 22-3 by Bucknell University.  Senior Stephen Espinet, junior Phil Myrick and Kwiatkowski accounted for all three goals while senior Neal Zoellick made seven stops.

Despite dropping their first two matches, the Knights returned to the pool to snatch a 13-11 victory away from Lindenwood University.

Naranjo and Myrick both led the team in scoring with four goals. The win marked the only time in five games, dating back to last season, where the Knights scored double-digit goals. Zoellick made five saves in the winning effort.

Gannon couldn’t keep their offensive momentum going in the afternoon as John Hopkins was able to bottle its attack. The Blue Jays were victorious 19-4.

The Knights take a 1-3 record into their next meet at Washington and Jefferson College Saturday at 11 p.m. Gannon was able to beat the Presidents in two games last season by a combined score of 29-23. 

CRISTIANNE JOHNSON

johnson126@gannon.edu