The fact that three of the seniors on this year’s No. 1 team—Hansen, two-meter specialist Christina Hewko and goalie Meridith McColl—come from Southern California is “what you would expect,” says head coach John Tanner. Only two-meter defender Alison Gregorka, from Ann Arbor, Mich., hails from outside the traditional SoCal stronghold. The four have known each other since eighth grade. “We went to the Olympic training center together—we call it ‘Colorado camp,’” Hansen says. “I went with Meridith, and Alison has random pictures of Hewko and me. It’s really funny.”
Because women’s water polo is such a small community, Hansen has competed with players on Mountain Pacific Sports Federation teams for years. But when they face off at NCAA championships, she says a different dynamic kicks in. “I’ve known them longer than my own teammates here at Stanford, but we’re all very competitive people. When we get there, we’re friendly and we say, ‘Hi,’ but we mostly stick with our teams.”
At this year’s MPSF championship game on April 29, the top-ranked Cardinal (27-3, 12-0 MPSF) lost for only the second time this season, to No. 2 UCLA, 9-3. Fourteen days later, UCLA again downed Stanford, 5-4, to win its third consecutive national title. “Up until the loss, it had been a really fun weekend,” Hansen says about the competition. “Winning NCAAs had been what we’d been focused on from the beginning, so losing was absolutely heartbreaking. But it doesn’t take away from what a great team and great season we were all lucky to have been a part of.”
Tanner, ’82, was named MPSF Coach of the Year for the fourth time in his 10-year career at Stanford, during which he has coached 11 U.S. national team members and six Olympians, earning one national championship and four conference titles. He says this season’s team was defined by its open offense, with the ability to score from a lot of different places in the pool, and by its unified defense. “At our best, we were pretty exciting, we scored a lot and we had a good mix of strength and quickness.”
Water polo takes core strength, good situational passing and what Tanner calls “the Big Trick”—positioning. “If you play good position, there’s not a lot that an offensive player can do underwater, above water, whatever.”
As the women maintained their No. 1 ranking throughout the season, Hansen says she and her teammates thought they would have an advantage over opposing teams. “We kind of hoped they would be dispirited in advance and make it easy for us [to win]. But that hasn’t been the case.” Instead, the women had a number of close calls. In the next-to-last game of the regular season, on April 20, they edged No. 6 Cal 10-8, with seven goals from seniors Hewko (3), Gregorka (2) and Hansen (2). When they beat No. 8 San Jose State 12-8 the following day, Hansen led the scoring, with four goals.
“This team was challenged in quite a few games, and responded in a very poised, competitive way,” Tanner notes. “You’ve heard about racehorses that allow competitors to catch up, and then turn it on? I think they might have been a little like that, allowing games to get a little closer, just so they could test themselves.”
Hansen, who collected 63 goals and was one of three finalists for the 2007 Peter J. Cutino Award, the Heisman trophy of women’s water polo, says her final season gave her a new understanding of the sport, thanks largely to Tanner’s coaching. “JT’s really good about teaching us how to think in a commonsense way, so we’re not memorizing certain ways to do things, but learning to react.”
Hansen says she’ll bring that experience back next year, as she completes requirements for medical school and finishes a master’s degree in religious studies. “JT really respected our time and made our practices efficient,” she adds. “He adjusted for our classes, so we could do everything we wanted to do.”
