Girls Season Preview Completed

The girls season preview is complete as of this Tuesday evening. Once again, if there are any glaring mistakes or even spelling corrections that need to be made, please email to illpolo@yahoo.com

Any coaches or anyone associated with teams who would like to help out with the information, I am looking to mention as many important players as possible...i.e. I would like to list and/or mention every team's starters if and when possible but it is extremely difficult without much to go by. Especially for team's who did not qualify for state and don't have their individual player info listed anywhere (year in school, position, etc.). Most times, I refer back to games or tournaments that I have seen, scoresheets from a previous year, or team rosters that tend to be inaccurate more often than not.

Thus, if one team has more written about it than another or has more players mentioned, it's likely that I just have more information available to me than trying to include/exclude anyone more than others.

The next step is to post the schedules...should be starting tomorrow. I have a list of 128 team schedules that I have to begin seaching for. I am also covering our girls' basketball team's trip downstate this weekend so I don't have the majority of free time that I used to have when compiling all that information. I'll stop whining now.

Final note on rankings...these are just one person's opinion and never meant to be treated as the AUTHORITY on how good a team is. I think that has usually been evident every year, it's just that I have the outlet to get information out and am at least usually more reliable than a Trib, Sun-Times, or Herald reporter who covers the sport once or twice per month. In all honestly, there are about 6-7 teams on both the boys/girls sides that it will take at least 2-3 weeks to figure out where they really stand, so you can probably toss the rankings out by then anyways...just kinda my note not to take them too seriously or at least to prevent a flood of emails calling me an idiot.

Any coaches with a Week 1 tournament schedule, please send to me as I am trying to plan the coverage for the opening weekend as soon as possible. Thanks.

Boys Season Preview Completed

The boys season previews for the Top 15 teams have been completed. It is difficult to find enough information about each of the teams, so if there are any teams that have less text than others, it is mainly because I don't have much info about some teams. Any coaches or players who wish to help add to their team's information can send an email to illpolo@yahoo.com. This also relates to any team who is not listed in the Top 15...all information about players and who is returning helps with the compilation of information during the season.

The girls preview should be completed tomorrow (TUESDAY) by the end of the school day.

February 21 - Site Updated!!!

For those who have checked the site today and have seen the updates, you will notice that there are still a few kinks to be worked out. Mainly, updating the team schedules as well as clearing the team rosters that are listed on the site and getting ready to update them for 2006. There may be some minor details and things with the site that could be off, but those should be worked out by Monday.

Check out the TV preview...its just an old, edited intro using some footage from two years ago, so the quality will definitely improve once the season gets started.

The Web Site Begins

Updating the 2006 Illpolo.com has been quite a struggle, as some of you who have been continuously checking the site only to find no updates have probably figured out. But as you can see, the site is now updated and should see some major additions in the next week or two leading up to the first games of the season just 14 days from now.

Welcome to the Illpolo.com 2006 blog site! Here you will find the random comments and things that happen on an everyday basis that aren't included in the regular game reports or news found on the site. Hopefully the blog will be an interesting read, as it will allow me to update the site from any computer during the day with little tidbits that I don't have time to update while at work.

Finally, we are still in need of donations for the 2006 season, as we hope to be able to provide video highlight shows and possibly DVD's for those who are interested in seeing themselves on film.

Once again, welcome...and we look forward to providing the best high school water polo coverage as possible!