The562’s coverage of aquatic sports in Long Beach in 2025-26 is sponsored by Watersafe Swim School.
The562’s coverage of Long Beach Wilson Athletics is sponsored by Joel Bitonio, Class of 2009.
It was a historic night for the Long Beach Wilson water polo program as family, friends and alumni filled the deck at the Bruins’ brand new aquatics facility.
After using the Belmont Pool for years, the Bruins opened their new facility with a dominating 16-7 win against Los Alamitos on Tuesday.
The Bruins led wire-to-wire as nine bruins found the back of the cage during the win.
“I think this was a really important game for a lot of people in the aquatics community,” Wilson coach Zac Polmanteer said. “A lot of history here. And so I do want to thank everybody for coming out all the years of support, you know, probably more than half of that crowd is alumni or parents of alumni. And so I think it shows, you know, how deep the Bruin blood flows and how much we love this sport and love this program and the support that we’re willing to show for this program.”
Samson Casem got the scoring started for the Bruins as they moved around the pool before he scored from the right side. Fernando Rejon pushed it to a 2-0 lead and Vaughan Baker extended it to give Wilson a 3-0 lead two minutes into the first period.
Los Alamitos’ Legend Cornell cut the lead to 3-1 with a backhand goal from the front of the cage.
“I want to give them a lot of credit for not quitting, not stopping the fight,” Polmanteer said of the young Los Alamitos team. “But I was really proud of my guys to do their job so that all of our players could get in the water, and, yeah, make their own impact on sort of this big momentous, first of the kind game.”
Nico Tramontano kept the Bruins offense pushing after he scored on a 6-on-5 opportunity to push the lead to 4-1. Gabriel Robles kept the scoring going to make it 5-1 at the end of the first period as the Bruins spread the ball around and got everyone involved.
It didn’t matter who Wilson had in the pool, everyone got involved and in on the action. Kai Bramble scored twice in the second period as the Bruins took a 9-2 lead at halftime.
Wilson kept the pressure going as they outscored the Griffins 7-5 in the second half.
The Bruins are currently ranked No. 5 in the CIF-SS ranks and are projecting to be in the open division when they playoffs begin – which makes the reps their entire roster is getting important as they will face even tougher opponents.
“This is an elite team,” Polmanteer said. ”This is an elite group of athletes. We’re seventh, we’re expecting that open division birth at the end of the year. That’s what we’re working for. And so now it’s about, you know, sharpening the knife, so to speak, and making sure that we are as clean and as precise as possible.”
Wilson will be back in league play when they head to Lakewood next Tuesday.
