Hello Lancers, your challenge:

100 games before your high school season: Are you up for that?

"Sunny Hills Water Polo-It's not some game I play, it's what I am"

Celebrating Five Decades of Water Polo at SHHS

2011-2012 Girls WP Schedule

2011 Boys WP Schedule

Ask Coach Nighswonger

Our Academic All Americans

Something To Shoot For

How Do You Play? 
Referees Read Here

Guardian Lancers

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

The Guardian Lancer Award

Sunny Hills Boy's Water Polo. 2005 Freeway League Season

Sunny Hills Girl's Water Polo.  2005 Freeway League Champions, & CIF Quarterfinalists 

Team Gear Page

Lancers Hand Coach N Victory #600...Read Here

Incoming Water Polo Players 

SH Water Polo News

The victory over Sunny Hills puts Troy in the Freeway League driver seat for now, with a much anticipated match up at Troy coming up on Feb. 7.

The victory for Troy over Sunny Hills, is just the 2nd win over the Lancers since 2004.

Freeway League Standings 1/18/12

On Thursday, Sunny Hills took on Sonora at Sunny Hills.  The Lancers never trailed pounding out an impressive 22 to 4 victory over the Raiders.

The two wins sets up a big showdown on Tuesday as Troy visits Sunny Hills.  The Lancers defeated Troy earlier in the season 11-10 in the third place game of the Ayala Tournament.

Amanda Solis, Tatiana Tuccio, Lexi Benoit and Julia Vanderpool were named to the All Tournament Team. 

The Lancers have opened the 2011-2012 season with victories over Westminster, Torrance, Trabuco Hills, (Division IV #7) Pacifica and Buena Park.

The Guardian Lancer Award is the top leadership award given in the water polo program. Candidates are selected by other Guardians. 

Sunny Hills Water Polo does not select captains, it requires players to first demonstrate leadership.  To find out more about this honor, please read the bottom of this page.

When you go to the site, don't freak out when the suits, shirts and hoodies are just black.  Sunny Hills never discloses our suit design before we break them out.  Gear is ultra cool this year!

BE AWARE-In order to get orders started, the store will be open until midnight, Monday, November 21st!

The store is open, click on this link!

Layana didn't waste any time, blasting an 8 meter shot early in the second quarter.  Layana would go on to score two more giving him 102 on the season.

In one of the most exciting games of recent memory, the Lancers drew 1st blood on a lob shot by Will Slope.  AG closed the first quarter with a 3 goal run to take a 3-1 lead at the end of one quarter.

AG led at half time 6-5 and going into the fourth quarter 8-7.  That's when the fireworks started. 

AG scored the first two goals of the fourth quarter to take a 10-7 lead.  The Lancers then on goals by Collin Layana, Justin Schotborgh and Calvin Liang tied the game at 10 with a little over a minute remaining.  AG was awarded a penalty shot and converted to put the game out of reach. 

AG will play Redlands East Valley in round two of the playoffs.

The Lancers took the lead in the first quarter and never looked back.  The win was Coach N's 399th career boys win over his 29 year coaching span.

Sunny Hills finishes the regular season with a record of 14-14 and a fourth place finish in the Freeway League (4-6)

Sunny Hills Water Polo is extremely proud to have both Tatiana and Alexis as members of our team!  They are both tremendous campus leaders and excellent examples to the rest of us-way to go girls!

Congratulations to seniors Lexi Benoit and Tatiana Tuccio who have endured a rigorous competition amongst Sunny Hills' brightest stars to reach the final court.

The Homecoming Court competition centers around community service, service to our school and general campus leadership.  Considering the elite competition, just making the "fab five" is an accomplishment in itself as 90 students began the process back in September.

Sunny Hills Water Polo wishes the best of luck to our "Polo Queens!"

The presentation is about 30 minutes and will be followed by a very informative  Q and A period.

Among the topics of the evening:

• How water polo opens the door to college admissions
• Going to a Community College?  Why you must play water polo!
•  Our proven 4 year plan to College Acceptance through water polo.
• Answered: Why is playing club so important?

In this era of ultra competitive college admission challenges, prospective candidates must have more than good grades and test scores.  Come find out what so many Lancers before you have discovered in their pursuit of college admissions.

Check the bottom of this page to see where our players go to school after leaving SHHS.

The win throws the Freeway League playoff race into chaos as every team in the league still has a shot at earning one of the coveted 3 spots for the CIF playoffs.

Last week Sunny Hills finished 14th in the El Dorado Tournament winning 2 and losing 3. 

There have been many bright spots in he first two weeks of competition.  The Lancers continue to earn 6 on 5 opportunities and are averaging  7 six on fives per game.  Lancer Collin Layana had a 7 goal outburst in an 11-7 win over Rancho Cucamonga on Saturday and Sunny Hills erased a 7-2 deficit to come back and defeat Canyon High School 12-11 on Friday night.

Sunny Hills plays Etiwanda at Sunny Hills on Tuesday starting a t 3:15.

Why National Level tournaments?

Playing at the National Level not only allows one to play water polo at the highest level, it also allow you to qualify for various national honors.  One such honor, which is a clincher for college acceptance is USA Water Polo's Academic All American Award.   Sunny Hills Water Polo has a great tradition of Academic All Americans (view our list) and this year 7 more names have been added to our list.

Congratulations to Lexie Benoit, Amanda Solis, Connie Garcia, Collin Layana, Calvin Liang Tanner Hart and Will Slope for being name a USA Water Polo Academic All American for 2012.

Click on this link:  TEAM GEAR and shop 'til you drop.

Note-Ordering windows are scheduled to allow for better pricing, if you receive an "out of stock" memo when you try to order it means that the shop is temporarily closed.  Please email us and we will work to get it open again.  Email us

Way to go Amanda we are very proud!

The National Honor Society is the nation's oldest student recognition program and focuses on the areas of Scholarship, Leadership, Service, Character and Citizenship.  Receiving this honor is rare indeed and we are proud of our Sunny Hills Water Polo players who have been selected to this program.

Several members of the graduating Class of Water Polo Players for 2011 have recently announced their fall intentions:

• Kevin Benoit-Lehigh University 
• Matt Luka-Western Washington U
• Kevin Ly-UC Riverside
•  Kody Lyng-Colgate University
• Scot Ninokawa-UCLA
• Mayra Davilla-San Diego State U

These Lancers join fellow Sunny Hills Water Polo players who announced their schools earlier.

• Alex Hoetker-Cal State Northridge
• Stephen Hodege-Lafayette College

Excellent job Lancers, congratulations.

Alex Hoetker announced on Wednesday that she will attend and play water polo at Cal State Northridge starting in the fall.  Alex was heavily recruited by several schools.

Sunny Hills seniors should email Coach Nighwonger when they make their college selections, the world wants to know!

2/21/11 -Freeway League Honors Awarded To Lady Lancer Water Polo Players-As the post season award announcements begin to be released, the Freeway League Coaches have released their annual All Freeway League Teams. For the second straight season Alex Hoetker has been named the Freeway League Most Valuable Player. Hoetker, a four year varsity player scored a record 333 goals over her four year career for Sunny Hills.

Additionally Sunny Hills placed three players on the First All Freeway League Team. Amanda Solis, who topped the 100 goal mark for the second straight season, Jordan Klein who was among the county leaders in both steals and assists, and Lexi Benoit who had a tremendous season defending 2 meters as well as being the team's 4th leading scorer.

The Lady Lancers also placed two players on the 2nd All Freeway League Team. Junior goalie, Julia Vanderpool who was one of the county's top 3 goalies in terms of goalie saves, including an incredible 20 saves against Los Osos in the quarterfinal game, and Tatiana Tuccio who scored several crucial goals in tough Freeway League matches this season.

Sunny Hills Coach, Keith Nighswonger was also named Co-Coach of The Year, and honor he shares with Jason Wilson of Troy .

2/19/11 -Lady Lancers Play Strong But Finish Short, Lose To Los Osos 10-6Los Osos High School is quickly becoming a problem the Lancers would just as soon see go away. For the third straight season, the Grizzlies have ended the Lady Lancers' season. On Saturday, Los Osos defeated Sunny Hills 10-6 in front of a packet house at Fullerton JC.

The game was not without its high points however as Sunny Hills dominated much of the game, even building a 6-3 lead in the 3rd quarter before a stunned and quieted Los Osos crowd.

However in the end, fould trouble, (the Lady Lancer starters had 10 personal fouls,) and a furious 4th quarter charge by Los Osos ended the season for Sunny Hills. The Lady Lancers finish with an amazing 26 and 3 record for the season, the best in Sunny Hills girls water polo history. 

Sunny Hills scored off of the opening sprint and never looked back.

The Lady Lancers will play their quarterfinal match against Los Osos High School at Fullerton Junior College on Saturday, February 19th.  Game time is 12 noon

Sunny Hills, the number 4 team in CIF Division IV will play Louisville High School on Thursday, 2/17 in the first round of the playoffs.

Trailing at half time 5-3, Sunny Hills put the clamps on during a 4-0 run in the third period in route to outscoring Troy in the second half 7-2! 

The win puts Sunny Hills into a first place tie with Troy as each team now has 7-1 Freeway League records.  There is still much to be done as the Lancers play two crucial games against Fullerton and La Habra.

The wins set up a show down match with Troy High School at Sunny Hills on Thursday, February 3rd.

The lead flip-flopped back and forth the entire afternoon as La Habra held the halftime lead 4-3.  Sunny Hills won the third quarter 3 to 1 to give the Lancers the lead going into the fourth quarter, but La Habra tied the score late in the game on a six on five and the game went to overtime.

Sunny Hills scored the only goal in overtime and held on to run out the final 26 seconds, the longest 26 seconds in the history of time!

The Lady Lancers travel to La Habra on Thursday for a key first round match up.

The loss drops Sunny Hills to second place in the Freeway League. 

The Lancers held a 4-2 lead after one period and then outscored the Coyotes 5-1 in the second quarter to take a 9-3 lead at half time.  Balanced scoring and excellent 2nd half defense led the way for Sunny Hills.

The Lady Lancers have run their record to an impressive 17-1 start.  Sonora will visit Sunny Hills next Tuesday.

The Lady Lancers used balanced scoring and excellent team defense to contain the very strong team from REV.  

The 12-0 start is the longest winning streak to open a season in school history and is only 3 games short of the longest winning streak of 15 games set by the 2005 team. 

The Lancers jumped out to five goal lead early in the 3rd quarter and then were forced to hang on as foul trouble and a determined Mission V team came back with a vengeance.  The Lancers survived 5 Mission Viejo penalty shots and held on to win 13-12.

Sunny Hills scored the first goal of the game but gave up the next two and continued to play catch up, until just before half time when the Lancers tied the score at 4.

The second half belonged to Sunny Hills as they outscored Warren 7-4 to win the game 11-8.

The Lancers defeated Magnolia High School 12 to 1, Beverly Hills High 17 to 7, Glendale High 15 to 5, Aliso Nigel 11 to 5 and Northwood 5 to 4 in the championship game.

In the championship match, Sunny Hills trailed 4 to 2 entering the final quarter but outscored Northwood 3 to 0 to claim the championship.

Sunny Hills enters the 2010-2011 season as the number 4 ranked team in Division IV.

Tuesday's match figured to be a close match.  Leading 2 to 1 after the first quarter, the Lancers outscored the Raiders 6 to 1 in the second quarter and never looked back, winning 16 to 6.

The win guarentees the Lancers a spot in the CIF playoffs with a shot to reach second place La Habra.

Sunny Hills was defeated by Troy on Thursday.

The Lancers finished the first round of Freeway League play in 3rd place with a record of 3 wins and 2 losses with no room for error if they were going to hold onto a playoff spot.

The match with Buena Park didn't start well for Sunny Hills who fell behind early in the game and couldn't get any traction to recover.  With 4:57 to go in the 3rd the quarter the Lancers trailed Buena park 11-5, however from that point forward Sunny Hills outscored the Coyotes 9 to 1 to close out the game 14 to 12.

Winning despite a six goal deficit marks the largest comeback in the history of Sunny Hills Water Polo, the previous largest margin of come back was five goals when the 2005 Lady Lancer team came from five goals down to defeat Temecula Valley 6 to 5.

Buena Park visits Sunny Hills on Tuesday as the Lancers begin Freeway League Competition.

Playing great defense, the Lancers held LH to zero goals in the 2nd and 3rd quarters as Sunny Hills mounted its comeback.

The Lancers started slow but finished strong in defeating the Highlanders 9-5

The Lancers defeated San Bernardino and Webb High Schools on their way to their first top 8 finish in the El Dorado High School event.

Playing for various clubs in the SOPAC Zone, 11 Lancers were honored for their academic excellence while participating in water polo at the national level.

To see a full list of Lancers named to the USWP AAA click here. 

Kim and Oba were instrumental in the Sunny Hills undefeated Freeway League Championship as well as its run to the Division V final four.  As valedictorians they have raised the bar on our standards of excellence to all new heights!  Way to go guys!

Be sure to check out the amazing Class of 2010 on our college acceptance list at the middle center of this page to see where our Lancers are going to school!

Congratulations Justin!

Huang, who played goalie for the Lancers this past year was elected to the prestigious position of "Guardian Lancer"  this past season. 

Huang is a mathematical statistics enthusiast, and will be among UCSB's first ever year class to major in Actuarial Science. 

Actuarial Science is the discipline that applies math and statistics to assess risk usually within industries like insurance and finance. 

Congratulations Steve, we are very proud!

Members have to maintain a GPA over 3.5, be a leader, and be involved with their community.  NHS members also serve globally as the organization encourages involvement in world issues such as Haitian Earthquake Relief.

Sunny Hills Water Polo is very proud of these Lancers.  Congratulations guys!

There are 6 All Southern California teams, as voted on by coaches from Santa Barbara to San Clemente, Hoetker was voted to the 5th team.  One other Freeway League Player, (Kate Kammer from Troy 6th team) was named to the All SoCal Team.

In addition, assistant coach, Alex Su (class of  '04) was also named to the list for his outstanding commitment to the Sunny Hills Water Polo Program.

It is now post season awards time and in the next few weeks we expect several Lady Lancers to be named to various league and CIF honors.

In defeating the Terriers, the Lancers showed a tremendous defensive effort holding Redlands to just one first quarter goal.

The win gives the Lancers their 3rd straight trip to Final Four, (D-VI in 2008, D-V 2009 and D-V in 2010.)

Sunny Hills will play Los Osos on Wednesday, February 24th at 3:30.  The game will be played at the Woollett Center in Irvine.

Trailing 5-4 entering the fourth quarter, the Lancers converted on two 6 on 5's, a natural from 2 meters, a penalty shot, and then clamped down the defense.

Friday the Lancers take it on the road to Beaumont High School, (California, not Texas) where they will play Redlands High School.

2/12/10-

Posting a 10-0 league record, the third in school history (2005, 2007 and 2010) the Lancers also set the record for team victories with 23 for the season, (23-4.)

CIF starts next Wednesday at Fullerton College as Sunny Hills will have the first round home game.

Final League Standings

Additionally Shin was 1st team All Freeway League in 2009 and 2nd team All Freeway League in 2008. Shin has led the Lancers to two straight final four appearances and the Freeway League Championship this season.

 Recently, Shin  had 20 saves in the championship clinching game against Troy on February 3rd.

Shin joins former Lancer, Jessica Ajoux ('03-Princeton) as Sunny Hills players to go to the Ivy League!  Congratulations Sarah!

With two games remaining, only Troy could match the Lady Lancers record and by virtue of the two league wins over Troy, Sunny Hills owns the tie breaker.

Entering the final week of Freeway League competition the standings show the Lancers with a two game lead and control of the tie breaker.

Tied 4-4 after four quarters, the Lancers went on to out score Troy 4-1 in the overtime period.

With three Freeway League games remaining, here are the standings:

Both teams came out swinging scoring a combined 10 goals in the first period, with the Lancers holding a 6-4 lead.

Sunny Hills had balanced scoring and strong defense over the final  three quarters.

Standings after the first round of Freeway League play

"At this stage of the year, experience is what the team is looking for, we are pretty much willing to play anyone, anywhere, if we can learn the game a little bit more," noted Coach N.

Trailing 9-8, the Lancers score with :43 remaining to tie the game and then scored the only goal of overtime with :51 remaining in the OT period.

At a time when college admission is not a guarantee, YOUR coaching staff will help you use your water polo experience to get into college.  You still have to study and do your homework, but the hours you spend in the pool mean a tremendous amount when it comes time to explain what you offer a college or university.

Yes, water polo can help you get into college, get you priority class scheduling, and provide other advantages for you when it comes time to do college applications.

Are you an 11th grader this season?  College apps are just around the corner.  Be sure to check with Coach N to see how you can use your water polo experience here at Sunny Hills in your college application process.

For more information e-mail here.  

On December 29th Sunny Hills defeated Palm Desert High School 12-3.  The win was Coach Nighswonger's 200th career girls victory.

Former Lady Lancer Gretchen Williams '07 has accepted a scholarship to play water polo at Wagner College in New York.  Williams who played two years at Fullerton College was a solid defender in her years at Sunny Hills.

Alex Su '04 has been accepted to Duke Law School.  "Coach Su" has been helping in the Lancer Water Polo program this year, he will be attending Law School in the summer.

Arlington, #2 is Division V CIF started strong scoring the games first four goals.  The Lady Lancers drew 12 exclusions but could only convert on two of them.

The Quest For 100 is the attempt to play 100 games before next Fall's high school season.  100 games is the equivalent of over three high school seasons and the Lancers are accepting the challenge in order to increase the team's experience level.

15 Lancers attended the scrimmages on Saturday morning.

We Miss You Dion