Dylan Woodhead was one of 13 men who participated in December's exhibition series against Italy and competed in Brazil to qualify for the 2019 FINA World Championships.
 
Woodhead comes from a strong aquatics background, as his father was a rower at Cal, and his mom was a swimmer at Stanford: "I played a lot of baseball growing up, and as I got into swimming a little more, I was introduced to the sport of water polo by my swim coach and also one of my friends. I started it in 6th grade, and the combination stuck very well, and I've been doing it ever since."
 
And shortly after Woodhead started, his brother joined him on the team, and for the most part they've played together ever since. 
 
The first water polo club Woodhead joined was Sleepy Hollow Aquatics, and after that he played for Sir Francis Drake High School under Coach Matt Swanson where he had many successes. Recalling his biggest highlight Woodhead says, "It was my senior season when we went 29-1. We ended up losing the last game in the section championship to Campolindo, but we won a couple of tournaments and our league championship that year. We definitely made a name for ourselves because it was the first year we made the Division 1 finals as a D3 school, which was definitely an accomplishment. It was pretty cool to be able to do that."
 
To go alongside a successful high school career, Woodhead also enjoyed a successful club career. Conveniently his club was centered at his high school—and each team shared the same coaches and most of the same players. This led to Woodhead growing really close to the same group of guys, and also it was special that his brother was with him. Recalling his best club moment, Woodhead says, "We ended up getting third during my 16 & under year at Junior Olympics playing next to my brother. We beat a really good Santa Barbara team and lost to Del Mar coached by Brett Ormsby."
 
Woodhead wasn't aware of the National Team growing up as he wasn't quite entrenched in the sport. It wasn't until high school that Woodhead started following the National Team, and one of the first tournaments he watched was the 2012 London Olympics. Following that he began playing ODP, which opened up a whole new world of water polo to him, and he began to look up to players like Tony Azevedo. His career with the National Team started when he made an ODP selection camp followed by the Youth World Championships in Montenegro. "We watched Montenegro play Croatia in the final," Woodhead says of his first experience "The whole town came out, and there were like 2,000 people watching a water polo match, and that was kind of eye opening to see the popularity around the world."
 
Before starting college, Woodhead was invited to Colorado Springs to train for the first time with the Senior National Team, which was headed to the Rio Olympics. It was his first major taste of the physicality, intensity, and speed of the senior team guys. Woodhead hadn't yet started college, so it was a big jump from high school and club water polo.
 
Following high school Woodhead was recruited by and joined the Stanford water polo team in the summer of 2016. His top highlight so far at Stanford has been winning the 2018 MPSF Championship over rival Cal. 
 
"It's a prestigious conference championship, and I got to win it with my brother, too," he recalled. "The big game rivalry has always been there in our family, and to win that this year was pretty special. Playing in front of a completely packed crowd is something I'll remember for the rest of my life." 
 
Since Woodhead is currently in college, he still juggles academics and sports. But to Woodhead, it really isn't that hard to do both since all of his teammates are going through the same challenge, and they all have the motivation to perform in the pool and in the classroom—which makes things easier. 
 
And after Stanford? Woodhead says he's unsure about what he wants to do—but he's considered playing professionally overseas. 
 
"The ability to go and play professionally is an opportunity that I'll have for a limited amount of time, and I definitely think it's a worthwhile experience and something I want to pursue," Woodhead says. "So yeah, I definitely think that's a major option for me after I graduate."
 
While at Stanford, Woodhead was called up to his first major FINA event—the 2018 FINA World Cup in Berlin. He flew there with his teammate Ben Hallock, and they had one day between their arrival date and their first game against Croatia—one of the best teams in the world. On his experience Woodhead notes that it was "cool" to play at that level "and compete against guys who do this for a living and have poured a lot of their life's work into it."
 
Woodhead is always looking to improve, so the recent games against Italy were a great learning experience for him, as he got the opportunity to play against top-shelf players like Icardi and DiFulvio. 
 
And as Team USA moves toward the 2020 Olympics, Woodhead is focused on taking one game at a time as he builds for the Games: "In my mind I kind of break it down into things that I can focus on short term and hopefully build for those Olympics games. I have to individually get bigger and stronger and refine my skills, and as a team there's obviously a lot of things we need to do—but the end goal is to make the Olympics and get on that podium."