Today, the McEndree University women’s water polo team kicks off the first game of the NCAA National Championship. McEndree’s inclusion would be big news on its own. It’s the first time they’ve ever made the NCAA tournament, which includes just nine teams across the U.S.—and typically few, if any, teams from the Midwest.

But this year, the private university in Lebanon, Illinois, about 30 minutes east of St. Louis, has even more reason to take pride in its season. The team lost its head coach in a fatal car crash in January, just as the season was getting underway—and they’ve been led in her absence by a 25-year-old in his first head coaching gig.

“It’s been an interesting year,” says Alex Figueras, who was only named the women’s head coach a few weeks ago after handling the job on an interim basis. “We had one of the lowest moments and some of the highest moments in the same season.” 

Figueras is the first to credit Colleen Lischwe as the person responsible for McKendree’s success. Lischwe had twice been named Missouri Female Water Polo Player of the Year at Kirkwood High School before becoming an Academic All-American at Marist College in New York and twice participating in the NCAA National Championships.

After coaching at Kirkwood High, Lischwe landed a coaching job at McKendree, and after being named the women’s head coach in 2017, also became the head coach of the men’s team the following year—making her the only woman head coach in an NCAA water polo program.

Then tragedy struck. Lischwe was on I-44 around 6 a.m. on Jan. 15, 2025, when she was struck by a semi. Her Prius fell off the highway to Vandeventer Avenue below. Lischwe, 35, left behind a husband and a 3-year-old daughter.

She also left a team in mourning. Figueras, Lischwe’s young assistant coach, was among those devastated by her death; Lischwe had coached his club team for a half-dozen years before they became colleagues. Suddenly he found himself trying to fill her shoes as the team headed into its first game of the season, less than two weeks later.

He recalls a team meeting with a sports psychologist, who explained that, tempting though it was, they should try to resist focusing on “winning one for Colleen” or making all their efforts about her. “You don’t want this to be the only thing that’s driving you, because at a certain point, things are going to go back to normal, or whatever normal looks like,” Figueras recalls him explaining. “When that happens, then you lose your motivation.” 

The very idea seemed shocking, he says. “When he brought that up, it seemed weird, because I was like, things are never going to be normal again, right?” But as winter turned to spring, and the team kept winning, it began to make more sense. 

“It’s not to say that we’ve moved on, because I don’t think we ever really will,” Figueras adds. “Like, there’s that little unspoken bond that I think we’re always going to have with this group and that is always going to be that extra motivating factor, that we can hear her voice still pushing us.”

Western Water Polo Association

Western Water Polo Association

For Figueras, Lischwe’s death brought responsibilities he wasn’t sure he was ready for. A graduate of Saint Louis Priory School, he’d gone from playing club sports to competing in college to returning back to St. Louis to finish his degree at Washington University, where he graduated with a double major in marketing and English. He soon fell into coaching. 

“Most people, I think when they get into this world, they get in as an assistant, and then they start trying to work their way up to eventually go be an assistant at a top five program, or go be a head coach somewhere,” he says. “And that was never my goal. My goal was always I wanted to do it until it wasn’t fun anymore, and then I would get out of it.” 

Guiding the team has given him new appreciation for the job. In April, McKendree won its conference championship for the first time; the team finished its season with a 21–7 record. 

Says Figueras, “It’s been cool to develop these relationships, and that’s the part that I’m enjoying the most. I think I’m starting to find my way and figure it out.”

He’s gotten support from another person who knew Lischwe for years—his own dad, Miguel. A former college player for Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, Miguel Figueras has spent the last 25 years coaching teams in the St. Louis area while teaching second grade for the Clayton School District. But this spring, McKendree offered him the head coach position for its men’s team—and so next year, father and son will be working together, father taking the lead with the men, son with the women. 

Miguel Figueras says he’ll miss his job at Wilson Elementary School, but he jokes that his new duties won’t be all that different: “In a lot of ways, I’ll still be around seven and eight-year-olds when I’m working with college freshmen and sophomores!”

Miguel Figueras knows no one can fill Lischwe’s shoes, explaining that she did a great job of looking out for all her players, many of whom came from so far away to participate in McKendree’s program. “Colleen was always the force in making sure those kids were well taken care of,” he says.

But he’s also proud of his son. “They’ve just picked up right where Colleen left off,” he says of Alex and his assistant coach, 23-year-old Breno Tebet.

And despite not being quite old enough to parent the team, the fledgling head coach has found a way to mentor its athletes, his father says.

“It’s like he’s got 23 little sisters,” he explains. “He’s always been a very mature kid, but we’ve seen a lot of growth in him here.”

Both father and son were heading to Indianapolis yesterday for the tournament, and Alex Figueras was trying to set realistic expectations. They have a strong chance against Wagner College in the first round, he says, but Stanford is “like UConn women’s basketball” (read: not an easy foe). 

He adds, “I don’t want to count ourselves out, but I think that definitely will be a challenge. But getting into this is a big deal for us, and we want to definitely not just be like, ‘Okay, we’re just happy to be here.’” 

And no matter how this topsy-turvy year ends, there’s always next year. Alex Figueras will be back, and so will all but one player, he says. The graduating senior is a standout, but having so many players returning should give the coaches a lot to work with. The team Colleen Lischwe built should have plenty of victories to come, even when there’s a new roster of players who can no longer hear her voice pushing them.

Two thousand sixteen was considered to be the peak year in Katie Ledecky’s career. At age 19, she won Olympic gold medals in the 200m, 400m, and 800m freestyle events, obliterating the world records in the latter two to 3:56.46 and 8:04.79, respectively. It was her final meet with her club team at Nation’s Capital Swim Club with coach Bruce Gemmell, and was the end of an unprecedented three year run where she broke 13 world records in that span.

In the nine years since, although she won two more Olympic gold medals in the 800m and 1500m freestyle events, and cemented her status as perhaps the greatest swimmer ever, her world records from her teenage years remained.

In the eyes of many, that was just fine. Although her 400m world record had since been beaten by two different people, her winning times in the 800m and 1500m at the World Championships and Olympics were still faster than anyone had gone before. Her status, if it hadn’t already been mutually agreed upon, as the greatest female swimmer of all-time was safe, no matter how the next few years in her career went as she reached the end of her 20s.

But every great athlete has that one final run that cements their legacy. When all is said and done, they still have a little bit of magic left. For Tiger Woods, it was the 2019 Masters. For Tom Brady, it was the 2020 Super Bowl. For Serena Williams, it was the 2022 US Open.

For Ledecky, that magic was on display this past weekend in Fort Lauderdale at the TYR Pro Swim Series.

When she went 15:24 in the 1500m freestyle on Wednesday night at the newly renovated Hall of Fame pool just across the street from the Atlantic Ocean, it was the start of something special.

On Thursday, against perhaps the best swimmer in the world right now, Summer McIntosh, Ledecky won the 400m freestyle and saw 3:56 on the scoreboard for the first time since the Rio Olympics – a 3:56.81.

“I don’t know if I ever thought I was going to be 3:56 again,” Ledecky said pool-side after the 400m freestyle, choking back tears in the process.

Those swims led to anticipation over how fast she could go in the 800m freestyle. Was a world record possible? Surely not, right? That 8:04 was so far out there that it hadn’t really been thought of to be beaten for generations.

The closest she had been since Rio? 8:07.07 at the 2023 World Aquatics Championships.

Before the last night of finals on Saturday night in Fort Lauderdale, Ledecky visualised what splits she could hold to go 8:04.6.

When she touched the wall after 800 meters, the scoreboard read 8:04.12.

“I can’t stop smiling,” Ledecky said after the 800m. “It’s been like that all week though so it’s not really new. It’s been so many years in the making. To do it tonight, it’s been an incredible night.”

The Pro Series was being held at the newly renovated Hall of Fame pool which was reopened in 2022 after the city of Fort Lauderdale pledged $27 million in renovations back in 2018.

The pool had once been a destination for some of the best aquatic athletes in the world, hosting many of the best swimmers of all-time in their careers. Since the facility first opened in 1965, ten World Records had been set in the facility, from names like Mary T. Meagher to Martin Zubero to more recent names like Natalie Coughlin and Michael Phelps.

Those names are immortalized on the wall outside the facility. Although the pool looks much different now than it did in 2002 when Phelps and Coughlin broke their records, the history stays.

Former ISHOF CEO Brent Rutemiller, who died last year after multiple battles with cancer, was one of the key figures in getting the renovations approved back in 2018, with the vision that the pool would once again host some of the biggest meets in the world.

“All the aquatic sports think of Fort Lauderdale as their second home,” Rutemiller said after the renovations were first approved seven years ago. “There will be a resurgence of events and activities as this venue returns to its world-class status.”

Rutemiller was my boss in my days when I worked with Swimming World Magazine and the International Swimming Hall of Fame. In my first month on the job, I sat in the City Council meeting when they voted yes to the $27 million renovation. I knew the pool was a big deal to people, but that moment changed everything for the future of the relationship between aquatic sports and that city.

You can smell the ocean from the pool deck. It is outdoors in sunny south Florida. There’s an intimate feel on the deck when you’re walking around. The restaurants and hotels are within walking distance of the place. Fast swimmers loved coming there and they showed out big time.

Flash forward seven years later, the pool is once again a destination for fast swimming, just what Rutemiller envisioned.

Ledecky, a connoisseur of swimming history, was well aware of the pool’s aura.

“I saw this morning after Gretchen broke the World Record that there’s a wall where they list all the world records, so I’m excited to be added to that,” Ledecky said after her record-breaking swim.

“My mom swam at the equivalent of NCAAs – AIAW, back in the 70s here. So I know she looked back at some of the old magazines at the Hall of Fame and found her name.”

Ledecky’s world record came just hours after fellow American Gretchen Walsh broke her own record, somewhat surprisingly, in the heats of the 100m butterfly, swimming 55.09 to lower her 55.18 from last year’s Olympic Trials.

After Ledecky swam her 8:04, surely enough, Walsh followed up with another record of her own in finals, becoming the first woman inside 55 seconds in the 100m butterfly at 54.60.

“I didn’t change any part of my race strategy,” Walsh said after becoming the first woman to go 54 seconds. “It was still going to be the goal of 17 strokes on the way out and then one less stroke, hopefully was going to give me more energy coming home because that’s where I always struggled – the last 15m.

“I have found that taking one less stroke has given me that extra energy and I did the exact same thing tonight. I was long into my turn and long into my finish as well, which I am kind of happy about because that means I can go faster.”

Walsh has been on a tear since finishing with the silver medal in the 100m butterfly at last summer’s Olympics, setting nine individual world records at the World Short Course Championships last December, and becoming the first woman inside 47 seconds in the 100 butterfly in short course yards.

Now Walsh has added to her own legacy as the first woman inside 55 in long course, as well as to the Hall of Fame Pool’s legacy as one of the fastest pools in the world.

“I wouldn’t say that I’m not surprised she swam that fast but it wasn’t expected,” Walsh’s coach Todd DeSorbo said. “She hasn’t raced long course since the Olympics, so it’s been ten months.”

In front of a packed house on Saturday night, Walsh and Ledecky reminded the swimming world why the city of Fort Lauderdale was right in resurrecting the facility after it was practically unusable before its facelift.

I sat with Rutemiller in numerous meetings about the future of the facility back in 2019. One of the things he insisted in conversations with sponsors was that the world record wall would remain, no matter what the new facility would look like.

“The history of this pool is important. We have to honor it,” Rutemiller told me numerous times when I worked for him.

The history indeed has stayed, and the next generation is following suit. Rutemiller wasn’t around to see it, but I know he’s smiling down.

Contributing: Gregory Eggert

For the first time ever, Greece team topped the podium at a Women’s Water Polo World Cup.

After not medalling at the 2024 Olympics nor the 2024 World Championships and coming in third in the Division 1 Tournament in February few had Greece on their radar as a potential winner. However, the Balkan country quickly asserted itself as a threat in Chengdu, starting with a 19-14 win against Italy in the quarterfinals. This earned them a semifinal berth against The Netherlands, the reigning Olympic bronze medalist. After trailing 6-9 to the Dutch women in the first half, Greece made a spectacular comeback to win 15-13.

In the final, which was Greece’s first in a major international competition since they took silver at the 2004 Athens Olympics, Greece sealed the deal by downing Hungary 13-9. Greek goalie Alexia Tzourka made an impressive 13 saves in this match.

For the Hungarian women, who are the reigning World Championship Silver Medalist, this tournament was a solid showing. Coming into the world cup, Spain seemed to be the team to beat, and Hungary did so in the semifinals. Kamilla Farago led the Hungarians through this slight upset, scoring five goals in a 10-8 final score.

After losing to eventual silver medalists Hungary, Spain also lost in the bronze medal match to the Netherlands 8-10. The Spaniards came in as favorites, topping the Division 1 Tournament earlier in the year and winning gold at the 2024 Olympics.

Greece, Hungary, and 6th place Italy all earned a berth for the 2025 World Championships. All eight teams that competed in the World Cup now have spots in Singapore.

Women’s Water Polo World Cup Final Ranking

1. Greece
2. Hungary
3. Netherlands
4. Spain
5. Australia
6. Italy
7. Japan
8. China