In the six years since it was established, the MSU Polo Club has grown from a few players using a wooden horse for practice to almost 30 members with a stable of 15 horses at its disposal.
Coach Tom Wisehart said the team began when the Detroit Polo Club approached the MSU Horsemen's Association and offered to help them form a team.
"We focused on starting from the fundamentals and going from there," said Wisehart, who played polo as an undergraduate at the University of Connecticut. He has been with the team since it started during his first year of law school in 1999.
Wyatt Myr, captain of the men's team and club president, is in his fourth year with the team.
Myr grew up around horses and joined the team as a way to continue spending time with them.
"I found the polo team, and it's been off and running since then," said Myr, an animal science and mechanical engineering senior. "Once you hit the ball, you're hooked."
Like Myr and most other members on the team, animal science and general management sophomore Darcy Workman had no experience with the sport before joining the women's junior varsity squad as a freshman.
Now a varsity player, Workman and her teammates help coach the JV women's squad.
"Teaching actually helps a lot because you can pick up on mistakes and correct your own," Workman said.
Myr said having the JV team is vital to the program because it provides learning experience for the new members.
Although a player doesn't necessarily have to know the sport to join the team, they should have a background in riding horses, Myr said.
"What I look for is a good rider," he said. "From there I can teach them how to swing a mallet."
The team's competitors, though, tend to be more experienced.
"Some of these programs have been around for 50 years or more," Wisehart said. "Their players come from polo families, they recruit from other countries...some students go to those schools just to play polo."
Despite the inexperience, Wisehart said the team's skill level is relatively high.
"If you compare us to the other startup teams, we're probably at the top," he said. "It's just going to be tough breaking into those schools with established programs."
