On the earth of water polo, three issues ring true: It is unique, costly and everybody appears to know one another. So, when Stanford College started investigating its males’s water polo coach, Brian Flacks, the varsity’s water polo group took discover. When Stanford started its second investigation into Flacks, the water polo group took sides.
The battle over Flacks’ teaching type facilities on what constitutes “robust love” versus “poisonous” habits. One faction says the battle is about what it alleges are Flacks’ abuse, retaliation and calls for for loyalty. One other faction blames the controversy on parental interference, gamers’ dissatisfaction over enjoying time and an incapacity to deal with the pains of collegiate play.
It has raised an age-old query: Do intense, overwhelming techniques make a staff higher, or do they tear a staff aside?
“Traditionally, coaches have been very rather more dictatorial: You do that as a result of I instructed you,” mentioned Tim Baghurst, director of Florida State College’s Interdisciplinary Middle for Athletic Teaching, which advises coaches on management greatest practices. “Now this technology of athletes don’t essentially reply properly to that type of instruction. They might wish to know why, they could wish to have the coach perceive their emotions or state of affairs or what they are going by way of.”
The Stanford controversy surfaced final September when the college obtained a proper criticism from two mother and father about Flacks’ teaching type. It precipitated Stanford to have interaction outdoors counsel Kate Weaver Patterson to research allegations of emotional and verbal abuse and pressuring athletes to play regardless of severe accidents. She is similar lawyer who investigated misconduct allegations towards Troy Taylor, the varsity’s former head soccer coach. Taylor was dismissed in March after ESPN revealed particulars of two investigations that have been prompted by complaints from staffers who mentioned he bullied and belittled them.
In Flacks’ case, Patterson decided there was “inadequate proof to seek out that any athlete’s therapy was outdoors of Stanford athletics and sports activities medication procedures” and “no intent by [Flacks] to create an unhealthy atmosphere,” based on a Feb. 13 letter to Flacks from then-athletic director Bernard Muir.
“Nevertheless, the investigator did discover that your depth and drive might be fairly perceived by gamers as overwhelming,” Muir wrote, noting Patterson’s suggestions of language changes and month-to-month mentoring on managing the pressures of the job.
However in April, Stanford launched a second investigation after mother and father and gamers, together with the unique complainants, alleged Flacks retaliated towards athletes who might need cooperated with the primary investigation. The outcomes of the second investigation, which was first reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, haven’t been launched.
ESPN submitted a number of requests to interview Flacks, however a Flacks consultant — unaffiliated with Stanford — insisted that written questions be submitted prematurely. ESPN declined.
Flacks’ lawyer, Rebecca Kaufman, characterised the primary investigation has having “absolutely exonerated” Flacks and, in a press release, mentioned that “any allegations of retaliation towards gamers are as preposterous as they’re false.”
A Stanford College spokesperson mentioned the varsity “expects all of our coaches to work diligently to develop a tradition of positivity, respecting the well being and well-being of our student-athletes, and to embrace constructive suggestions for enchancment.”
The college additionally famous that Patterson, within the first investigation, didn’t discover any proof of an “unhealthy atmosphere.”
WHAT MAKES THIS battle so uncommon is the very public and messy battle that has emerged on this largely insular, unique sport. Harvard, Princeton and Brown are among the many 28 Division I faculties providing males’s water polo. Nevertheless it’s the California faculties — Stanford, UCLA, USC and the College of California-Berkeley — that have a tendency to draw the highest expertise. Of the 13 males’s water polo Olympians representing america on the 2024 Paris Video games, all however one attended a big-four California faculty.
Gamers, mother and father and coaches work together yr after yr at tournaments, video games and occasions, with a significant objective of getting gamers into the Olympics. The reputations of all matter. Phrase can get round quick, with fear that criticism of coaches can have an effect on the careers of athletes at an elite college with a robust alumni base.
The worry amongst gamers is “not solely will I not play, however all these alumni will destroy me,” one former elite Stanford water polo participant instructed ESPN.
When the battle at Stanford spilled into public view, a couple of gamers give up the staff. Friendships break up amongst mother and father. Legal professionals and public-relations professionals have been employed.
A number of gamers nonetheless on the staff — supporters in addition to critics of Flacks — instructed ESPN the staff, tied for third nationally within the last 2024 Collegiate Water Polo Affiliation rankings, is in disarray. The investigation and its aftermath created stress with teammates who do not know whom to belief. Practices are noticed by a college official. The gamers say the drama is affecting recruiting efforts as phrase spreads about tensions on the staff.
Amongst recruits’ questions: whether or not Flacks will nonetheless be the top coach subsequent season.
ESPN reached out to just about 4 dozen folks and spoke with 25 to be taught concerning the disputes which have torn the staff aside. Most spoke solely on situation of anonymity. Even these lengthy faraway from the day-to-day actions of the staff mentioned they feared retribution.
“Nobody desires to speak,” mentioned one other alumnus and former elite participant, describing the group as “paralyzed by worry.”
However a number of defenders of Flacks referred to as his type “intense.” In an interview with the college pupil newspaper, The Stanford Each day, mum or dad Danielle Pittman referred to as it “robust love” and in contrast the coach to former Alabama head soccer coach Nick Saban. Her son, Riley Pittman, was one among 5 gamers who selected to play their fifth and last yr below Flacks within the 2024 season.
Each mom and son instructed the complaints boiled right down to gamers’ unhappiness over enjoying time.
“Division I sports activities, particularly at this stage, may be very troublesome. It’s extremely aggressive, and never all people’s going to be joyful, and that is unlucky. However the lucky factor is that there is this factor referred to as the [transfer] portal,” Danielle Pittman mentioned.
Riley, the staff’s captain throughout the 2024 season, credited Flacks with “serving to develop my sport greater than any coach has ever accomplished. He is taught me a lot about management and the best way to be a greater individual, a greater man.”
Daniel Mnatsakanian performed for Flacks in highschool and now at Stanford. “He’s a coach who unconditionally cares for his gamers,” Mnatsakanian mentioned. “He’s an extremely troublesome coach to play for as a result of he calls for excellence, and he calls for you to be the perfect. And I’m eternally grateful for him.”
Many who assist Flacks pointed to the identical “three households” they mentioned are sad.
However seven present and former gamers or their households confirmed to ESPN that they raised points with Stanford about Flacks’ teaching type. All of them requested to not be named for worry of retaliation. They described a tradition of isolation and psychological warfare, the place gamers have been discouraged to talk with one another or their mother and father concerning the state of the staff.
Gamers instructed ESPN that Flacks froze them out, belittled them and referred to as them names resembling “bottom-feeders” and “victims.” The San Francisco Chronicle quoted mother and father making comparable remarks.
One participant described Flacks’ teaching type to ESPN as “poisonous” and mentioned he skilled unrelenting stress and strange bouts of crying.
“Saying that Flacks is only a tough-love coach, that is full bulls—. I’ve performed for tough-love coaches; most of them are …” mentioned the participant, who has performed at nationwide and worldwide ranges of competitors. “I am telling you, it was not robust love. That’s only a full mischaracterization of his teaching type. Powerful love doesn’t embrace psychological video games or any type like that. … [It] would not offer you a free go to mentally [mess] with children.”
The gamers denied that enjoying time factored into the formal criticism with the varsity.
“The easiest way to explain it’s he runs an authoritarian regime, the place you can’t converse a phrase towards him … or else you turn out to be singled out,” one former participant mentioned. “I do know what’s regular and what’s not. The way in which he runs this system just isn’t regular.”
A number of gamers mentioned they skilled bodily signs resembling sleeplessness, anxiousness assaults, vomiting round follow occasions and/or crying that they attributed to emphasize. They reported they’d not skilled any of these bodily signs earlier than or after enjoying for Flacks.
The mom of the previous participant mentioned she was so involved about her son that she flew to the college to do a wellness verify and ensure he wouldn’t take any “rash steps.”
“On the time, I did not know whether or not his expertise was distinctive,” she mentioned. “I knew that by the top of the season, all people was worn down, all of the gamers have been worn down bodily, emotionally.”
5 of the gamers say they reported their issues to Patterson, the investigator, who finally decided there was no violation of Stanford’s procedures.
THE ANSWER TO WHAT is efficient teaching is a decades-old query, mentioned Dr. Timothy Fong, director at UCLA’s Sport Psychiatry Companies. He notes that “the facility battle will at all times be there” between coaches and athletes, however either side ought to honor boundaries.
“If it is agency criticism associated to your athletic coaching, efficiency and energy, that’s falling within the line once more of acceptable teaching methods,” Fong mentioned. “If it is belittling you as an individual, not as an athlete, that is totally different.”
A coach crosses the road if criticism ventures into an athlete’s immutable traits, resembling gender, race or orientation. It isn’t as clear reduce when criticism is obtained as an assault.
Fong mentioned bodily signs described by the gamers are “very a lot purple flags by way of a staff tradition that is not working easily and in the easiest way potential” however cautioned that not all such habits signifies publicity to abuse.
Fong and Baghurst mentioned gamers have extra choices now due to the switch portal however mentioned higher communication between coaches and gamers is a elementary step.
“Many coaches lack coaching on how to make sure that a training philosophy, a training type, is known and agreed upon by the athletes,” Baghurst mentioned. “And if that does not occur, then miscommunication can happen.”
It is as much as Stanford to resolve what sort of tradition is suitable or not, Fong mentioned.
“Each coach in faculty athletics is finally an worker of any college that you just work with,” he mentioned. “They’re certain to the skilled requirements of being an worker of the college.”
Riley Pittman mentioned he has “by no means met a coach who was extra clear [than Flacks] about his expectations and communicates extra clearly what he wants and desires from his gamers.”
A number of gamers mentioned they discovered that the investigation was full when Flacks held a quick staff assembly in February to tell them he was cleared. The gamers mentioned Flacks didn’t talk about a reset or provide changes to his teaching type. As an alternative, he ignored a few of them throughout follow, instructed some to switch to a different faculty, or mentioned they’d see lowered enjoying time. In the end, two gamers did give up the staff, later saying their departures weren’t voluntary.
One participant who helps Flacks, however who acknowledged an initially antagonistic relationship with the coach, described the staff’s spirit as presently “fragile.”
The Stanford staff began to fracture publicly after the San Francisco Chronicle first reported the investigation towards Flacks on March 31. The article cited mother and father who have been annoyed with the method and its outcomes. The Orange County Register adopted go well with. Orange County is named a water polo hotbed.
4 days after the articles have been printed, Brian Avery, a Stanford alumnus and influential donor, whose household the Avery Aquatic Middle is known as after, despatched an e mail in assist of Flacks to a Stanford water polo alumni group.
“FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE HISTORY OF OUR WATER POLO FAMILY, newspaper articles are showing all through the state of CA,” Avery wrote.
Due to “the magnitude of enhancements to Stanford Water Polo,” he added, “I wrote a $100,000 verify to Lifetime Cardinal,” Stanford’s NIL collective.
Inside two weeks of Avery’s e mail, 14 gamers and 32 mother and father co-signed two letters in assist of Flacks, and The Stanford Each day printed a supportive letter to the editor from a pair of Stanford alumni and Olympians, Ben Hallock and Dylan Woodhead, neither of whom performed for Flacks at Stanford however educated with him elsewhere. In addition they in contrast Flacks to Nick Saban.
“Elite coaches obtain this [level of performance] by guaranteeing that nothing you face in a sport is extra intense than what you encounter in follow,” the lads wrote. “If you cannot maintain up in follow, you possibly can’t count on to do it when it counts.”
Hallock and Woodhead went on to reward Flacks, writing, “He constructed up our psychological toughness.”
Comply with-up tales appeared in all three newspapers concerning the retaliation investigation. The Stanford Each day printed one other letter to the editor from Hannah Parrish, a mum or dad who helps Flacks. She referred to as out the “three households” as troublemakers.
The fracture deepened over the participant letter, which was supplied to ESPN by a Flacks-hired media consultant, David Shane. It said, “the gamers who’ve signed under assist our teaching workers, and denounce any slanderous accusations and defamation towards our staff, our tradition, and our teaching workers.”
A number of gamers instructed ESPN they felt pressured by teammates to signal the letter. They mentioned teammates instructed them coaches knew who signed and who did not. In addition they mentioned teammates hovered over fellow gamers throughout the signing course of, which one described as vocally coercive and filled with expletives. As an alternative of uniting the staff, the participant mentioned, the letter served as a wedge.
A senior participant, CJ Indart, mentioned he didn’t witness anybody pressuring others to signal the letter and mentioned he instructed teammates to signal provided that they needed to.
“I simply needed to make it possible for we as a staff are on the identical web page and I simply made certain that everybody was in a position to categorical how they felt,” mentioned Indart, who signed the letter in assist of Flacks.
STANFORD HIRED FLACKS in 2022 after longtime head coach John Vargas retired. Flacks had beforehand spent greater than a decade on the elite Los Angeles personal faculty Harvard Westlake, the place he coached the boys’ and women’ water polo groups and received a number of titles throughout his tenure.
Coming straight from a highschool staff to a school head coach function just isn’t uncommon within the sport. However, some observers of the staff mentioned they have been shocked when Flacks edged out different candidates with extra expertise.
Flacks’ grandfather Craig Barrett, a former CEO of Intel, has donated over $1 million to the college, the Orange County Register reported with out specifying a time-frame for the donations. A spokesperson for Stanford says Flacks was employed based mostly on his deserves.
Beneath Flacks, the staff has 60 wins in three seasons and reached the NCAA semis final yr, Stanford’s greatest displaying since reaching the semis in 2020. The staff received the nationwide championship in 2019.
Among the many big-four faculties, something wanting reaching the championship match is considered as a disappointment, gamers, alumni and oldsters mentioned. By that measure, Flacks’ teaching techniques have but to yield success.
The continued drama continues to forged a shadow over the staff’s efforts to give attention to water polo and recapture Stanford’s former glory.
“My largest want,” Alex Gheorghe, a participant who helps the coach, mentioned, “is simply to have the ability to fear about water polo and being a pupil.”