The Palo Alto High School varsity boys’ water polo team fell to Los Altos 17-6 this Wednesday at Paly.

The Vikings could not find a way to defensively contain Los Altos’ top scorer, driver Colin Mulcahy (’11), who had eight goals in the first half. The team also struggled with a stagnant offense throughout the game.

“It was a little rough,” driver Ken Wattana (’11). “We didn’t really execute our game plan that we had coming into the game.”

Wattana scored two goals for the Vikings.

The Eagles took a decisive lead early on with three quick goals in the first two minutes. The first quarter ended with the Vikings trailing by seven goals, six of them coming from Mulcahy.

“We were trying to stay behind him [Mulcahy] and not foul him, but he ended up getting a lot of fouls and shooting a lot,” driver Bret Pinkster (’13) said.

The Vikings only allowed two goals early in the second quarter. However, they scored just one goal in the first half.

“We were supposed to run plays [offensively] and we didn’t,” Paly coach Giovanni Napolitano said.

The third quarter brought more scoring opportunities for Paly. The team hustled offensively and put the ball into the back of the net three times. The fourth quarter, however, was more similar to the first half, as the Eagles scored four times and the Vikings only scored twice.

The Vikings attribute the rough loss to their poor offense. The Eagles were able to use Paly’s sub-par offense to their own advantage and the majority of their goals were off of counter-attacks.

“We missed and they definitely countered off a lot of that,” Wattana said.

The Vikings look to improve their offense and play harder defense going into the remainder of the season.

“We need to work on communication and we need better passing,” coach Napolitano said.

The Vikings lost again in a close match with Monta Vista High School, 9-7, on Thursday at Monta Vista.