An attacker from Auckland, Bella Raynes arrived at West Valley College in the autumn of 2023. She immediately established herself as one of the top players in California community college water polo. Across two seasons, she earned Newcomer of the Year honours, All-America recognition, two All-Coast Conference First Team selections, and helped lead the Vikings to back-to-back Coast Conference Championships before transferring to California Baptist University on scholarship.
There is a detail in Bella Raynes' freshman season at West Valley College that tells you more about her than her goal tally does.
She scored 65 goals. She also led the team in assists with 48 while recording 53 steals and shooting at 63.7 percent efficiency. For a water polo attacker in her first year of American collegiate competition, that combination is unusual. Most players who arrive producing goals at that rate are doing so by taking the ball and shooting. A player who simultaneously creates for others, disrupts defensively, and finishes at a high percentage is reading the game differently, seeing options that others do not, and choosing the play that serves the team over the one that serves the statistics.
That quality is harder to develop than finishing ability, and it tends to be the one that coaching staffs and future programmes value most when they are assessing an athlete's real contribution.
Bella is now entering her senior year at California Baptist University after transferring on scholarship following two standout seasons at West Valley College. During her time there, she earned Newcomer of the Year honours in 2023 before adding All-America, All-NorCal, All-Coast Conference First Team, and All-State Tournament Team recognition in 2024. Across two years, she finished with 177 goals, 89 assists, 96 steals, and a remarkable 64 percent shooting percentage.
She also helped West Valley continue one of the most dominant runs in California community college water polo, contributing to consecutive Coast Conference titles and another NorCal finals appearance.
What makes the story even more interesting is that Bella came from the same Auckland pathway as fellow Platform Sports athlete Bailey Hollick. Both were developed through the same high school and club system before heading to California in 2023. Now, for the 2026-27 season, the two will reunite at California Baptist University after Bailey also transferred there — a full-circle moment that says a great deal about the strength of the pathway they came through together.
Bella and Bailey Hollick both developed through Waitakere Water Polo Club in Auckland before heading to California in the autumn of 2023. Bella was named Senior Women's Most Improved Player at the club, while Bailey earned Most Valuable Player honours the same year.
The fact that both were placed into California community colleges through the same recruitment process reflects something worth noting for families thinking about the water polo pathway: Platform Sports was not simply finding any available programme for each athlete. It was finding programmes suited to where each player was in their development at that specific moment.
For Bella, West Valley College in Saratoga, in the San Francisco Bay Area, proved to be the right environment. The programme competes in the Coast Conference under coach Erika Vargas, whose consistency has made West Valley one of the premier community college programmes in California. The Vikings continued their dominance during Bella’s time there, extending their conference championship streak while consistently competing deep into the NorCal postseason.
Now, after initially taking separate collegiate paths, Bella and Bailey will once again become teammates at California Baptist University — back together after progressing through the same Auckland school and club system years earlier.
Bella's freshman season in 2023 immediately established her as one of the most important players on the West Valley roster. She finished the year with 65 goals, 48 assists, 53 steals, and a 63.7 percent shooting percentage while earning Newcomer of the Year honours and All-Coast Conference First Team recognition.
Her ability to balance scoring efficiency with playmaking quickly separated her from most first-year players at the level. West Valley again finished atop the conference standings, continuing the programme’s long run of success.
Her sophomore season in 2024-25 raised the standard even further.
Bella exploded offensively for 112 goals while adding 41 assists and 43 steals, finishing with a 64 percent shooting percentage across the year. Her performances earned All-America honours alongside All-NorCal, All-Coast Conference First Team, and All-State Tournament Team recognition.
At the Coast Conference Championship tournament, she led the opening quarter with five consecutive goals as West Valley built an insurmountable early lead, finishing with two goals in the final. The Vikings won another conference title, and she was again recognised among the best players in California community college water polo.
In the NorCal tournament, she was the most dangerous player on the field in the opening half of the third-place match against Riverside City College, scoring seven goals across the first two quarters, including three in a row in the first period and all four West Valley goals in the second. Riverside adjusted specifically to limit her in the second half, which is its own kind of acknowledgement of the problem she creates for opponents.
By the end of her community college career, Bella had compiled 177 goals, 89 assists, and 96 steals across two seasons while maintaining 64 percent shooting efficiency; production that ultimately earned her a scholarship transfer opportunity to California Baptist University.
Bella's pathway is a useful complement to Bailey Hollick's in this series, because together they make the same argument from two different angles.
The California Community College system for water polo is not a consolation route. It is a genuinely high-quality development environment that produces nationally recognised players, championship programmes, and legitimate transfer opportunities into NCAA scholarship environments.
Bella’s story also reinforces something important about long-term athlete development: pathways are rarely linear. Two athletes can come from the same school and club environment, take different routes through California, and still arrive at the same NCAA destination years later, now reunited as teammates at California Baptist University.
For Bella specifically, the assists record remains the editorial detail that matters most for families thinking about what to look for in a player's profile. The best water polo players are not simply the ones who score the most goals. They are the ones who make the game easier for everyone around them, who create more options than they consume, and who improve the quality of their team's attack by the decisions they make before they even touch the ball.
Bella arrived in California already doing that at 18 years old. Two years later, she left West Valley as an All-American and scholarship transfer athlete. Whatever comes next at California Baptist University, that foundation is already built.
If you are a student-athlete or parent trying to understand the U.S. college pathway, start with a conversation. Platform Sports can help you understand your options, your timeline, and what the right fit could look like.
