Warriors heat up late

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ST. CHARLES – The McHenry boys water polo team consistently has gotten off to slow starts this season.

The Warriors were no different Monday, allowing four St. Charles East goals to start the game and trail, 5-2, after the first quarter.

“Every game, we start slow,” McHenry’s Reilly Shanahan said. “We [stink] in the first quarter.”

After that it was all McHenry, which dominated the next three quarters to win, 19-6.

The Warriors are ranked 10th in the state by Illpolo.com and were not expected to be challenged by unranked St. Charles East (5-2), even if only for one quarter.

“If there was one thing we could stop doing, that would be it,” Warriors coach Craig Fowles said of his team’s slow starts. “No matter who we’re playing we make it a good game.”

Fowles said McHenry (3-1) allowed terrible goals and played awful defense in the first quarter. He wasn’t sure what the solution was short of lighting a fire under his team in the locker room before games.

“They just need to get pumped up before the game starts,” Fowles said. “Apparently, I’m not doing that.”

Shanahan led McHenry with nine goals, including four consecutive to start the fourth quarter to put the game out of reach. Phillip Lesniak added three goals for the Warriors, and Andrew Schmidt and Tim Briscoe each scored twice.

Dan Brucki made nine saves for the Warriors and overcame a rough first quarter to limit St. Charles East to one goal during the final three quarters.

Despite the slow start, Shanahan said he wasn’t concerned that the game was slipping away. Most of that optimism was due to McHenry allowing some easy goals rather than getting overpowered by the Saints’ offense.

“I wasn’t ever scared,” Shanahan said. “We always sink down to anybody’s playing level.”

Saints coach Sean Markovic said that even though St. Charles East started the season, 5-0, McHenry was a class above any other competition the team had faced.

“The competition we played wasn’t up to this,” Markovic said. “I was hoping we’d hang on a little longer.”

Shanahan said the slow starts were troubling, but he saw positive signs that his team is making progress.

“This whole season we haven’t gotten it all together,” Shanahan said. “Every game we’ve gotten a little better.”