Westmont’s men’s polo team
The Westmont Men?s Polo Team notched another U.S. Polo Association Western Region Championship on March 24 and will compete in the National Intercollegiate Championships on April 9-13 near Houston.
Last year, the Warriors came in second place after narrowly losing to the University of Virginia in the national championship game at Cornell University in New York.
The Warriors begin play against Southern Methodist University on Tuesday, April 9, at the ERG Arena in Brookshire, Texas. UVA will also be defending its national title against Cornell, Colorado State and Washington State Universities. This year?s Westmont team includes captain Patrick Uretz, David Samaniego, Tony Uretz, Ky Koebele, Jake Bergman and Taylor Longo. John Westley, owner/operator of the Santa Barbara Polo School, has coached the team for the past 13 years.
The Warriors beat the University of Idaho and Stanford University to win the Western Regional competition. Westmont has won the Western Regionals and gone to nationals seven of the past eight years and played in the national championship game in 2012 and 2007. Polo became a club sport at Westmont in 2000.
The team practices with Westley at the Santa Barbara Polo School and plays games throughout the five-month season (November-March) on weekends, riding horses on loan from the Santa Barbara Youth Polo Association. The USPA Intercollegiate/interscholastic program has grown increasingly popular, adding 25 junior high, high school and college teams since 2010 for a total of 107.
Westley debunks the stereotype that polo is for the privileged.
?Almost all the players in the program are on need-based scholarships from the Santa Barbara Youth Polo Association that pays for up to 70 percent of the cost of the program,? he says. ?We have players from all walks of life with different financial needs, so anyone can participate.?
