{"id":257786,"date":"2017-05-26T09:30:02","date_gmt":"2017-05-26T16:30:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/?p=257786"},"modified":"2017-05-26T13:00:33","modified_gmt":"2017-05-26T20:00:33","slug":"257786-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/257786-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Catching Up with Bill Smith of Greenwich Aquatics"},"content":{"rendered":"

BY Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor<\/p>\n

The 2017 Junior Olympics Northeast Zone Qualification (NEZ)\u2014held last weekend in Greenwich\u2014was yet another example of how this tony Connecticut community has become the epicenter for East Coast water polo. At the Greenwich YMCA\u2019s Olympic-sized pool, 42 teams from Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania competed in five different age groups to qualify for the 2017 Junior Olympics<\/a> Water Polo Tournament in Irvine, CA<\/p>\n

NEZ JO\u2019s were overseen by Greenwich Aquatics<\/strong><\/a>, which oversees one of the region\u2019s largest age group programs. The brainchild of Bill Smith<\/strong>, a USA Water Polo at-large board member, Kim Tierney Wang<\/strong>, Director of Operations, and Head Coach Ulmis Iordache<\/strong>, Greenwich Aquatics is now the envy of clubs throughout the country.<\/p>\n

With consistent success in some of America\u2019s most prestigious tournaments, and a track record of developing players who compete at the sport\u2019s highest level\u2014including Thomas Dunstan<\/strong>, a member of the U.S. National Men\u2019s Team that competed in the 2016 Rio Olympics\u2014Greenwich competes with and often beats the top California clubs.<\/p>\n

Smith, who has spent that past two decades growing the sport in the Nutmeg state, is a graduate of Villanova and the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. He began organizing age group polo in 2000 with the Greenwich Youth Water Polo Club where his son Will and daughter Patty competed before going on to play for Stanford and Harvard respectively. In 2008 he partnered with the Greenwich YMCA to launch Greenwich Aquatics, sparking impressive growth<\/a> of the sport in the Northeast.<\/p>\n

Smith recently spoke to Swimming World <\/em>about polo\u2019s development on the East Coast, the challenges of competing out West, and his dedication to building a strong foundation to expand water polo throughout the country.<\/p>\n

What is your history with East Coast youth polo and the Junior Olympics?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Way back in the day, the only age group club from the East Coast that went to Junior Olympics was the Navy<\/a> club under (Mike) Scofield<\/strong> and Mladen (Stanicic)<\/strong> and others that were around at that time, including Carl (Quigley)<\/strong>. Mike was the zone chief at the time.<\/p>\n

I started the Greenwich Water Polo Club <\/strong>[in 2000]. We saw dramatic growth right from the beginning and within three years were up to 270 kids. Wilton High School\u2019s coach Brooks Ensor<\/strong> was doing a great job, my kids played for him before they [joined] what we used to call Greenwich Youth Water Polo. Then we moved it to Greenwich Water Polo and now it\u2019s Chelsea Piers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I was the coach of the first team that we took out to JOs from Greenwich area in 2001. Years ago, Terry Lowe<\/strong> [former head coach at Greenwich High School] took his 18-U high school teams out there but that had been well over a decade ago.<\/p>\n

I started with a 14-U girls team. They didn\u2019t have the various levels and all the other stuff [they have now]. We finished where you finish when you\u2019re first starting. The rule is that when you\u2019re new you play like you\u2019re new. And we were new.<\/p>\n

Qualifying was never much of an issue because it was Navy and us. Navy was the steady force [attending] JOs with solid youth teams. I give a lot of credit to Mladen and Scofield. They were doing the college stuff and then to put so much energy into the youth side\u2014it\u2019s unbelievable. The physical effort, the pool time\u2014they certainly are the role model for any collegiate coach to show what they can do at the age group level.<\/p>\n

The early days rolled from there. When I took that first team out there were some people who discouraged us from going.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think you should be going out to this thing because you know you\u2019re going to lose by a lot and this is going to be humiliating for the kids,\u201d they said. \u201cThey\u2019ll drop out.\u201d<\/p>\n

I said: \u201cWell, indeed the first year we\u2019re going to be that way. By the second year we may even know who the teams are out there and by the third, fourth and fifth they may even know who we are.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now we go to JOs and it\u2019s so funny, one of the [California] coaches came up and I said I\u2019m from Greenwich, Connecticut. They said: \u201cMy gosh, Connecticut! That\u2019s great! I\u2019ve only been playing California teams. It\u2019s so great that you guys are out here.\u201d<\/p>\n

I said: \u201cLook, it\u2019s no problem at all. I have someone in the stands who speaks fluent Californian. If we ever have any issues, we\u2019ll be able to work this thing out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Everything\u2019s outdoors in California. Here it has to be indoors if you want to do anything close to year-round.\u00a0 We\u2019re out there and it was the 16-U girls\u2019 the first year they had a gold division and we had just beaten Stanford A team and won a gold [2008]. It was a huge win with Taylor Dunstan\u2014Thomas\u2019s sister\u2014who was on that team.<\/p>\n

Here we are Connecticut, East Coast, and the response was: \u201cYou know, you guys are actually legit. But I have a question for you. Doesn’t it snow in Connecticut? How do you [play in the winter]?<\/p>\n

They\u2019re thinking outdoor pools.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe come out with these mallets and hack off the top of the ice,” I said. “The kids go in there and after a couple of laps they\u2019re good to go!\u201d<\/p>\n

And he said: \u201cReally?!\u201d I said: \u201cNo, not really!\u201d [Laughs]<\/p>\n

I end up pulling their leg all the time.<\/p>\n

Now we\u2019re really legit. We went out to the KAP7 Cup<\/strong> [last April] with sixty other teams and two of our age groups got first place and the 18-U girls got second. They know that the East Coast is coming on. I would say that the level of the East versus West has stepped up a lot.<\/p>\n

\"greenwich_smith\"

2008 Greenwich Aquatics 16-U Team at Junior Olympics. Photo Courtesy: Bill Smith<\/p><\/div>\n

To what do you attribute the growing respect Greenwich\u2014and by extension East Coast\u2014water polo is now gaining?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The fact of the matter is that our sport\u2014much like lacrosse or soccer, is a team sport\u2014and a big part of the learning is experiential. There\u2019s an old saying in coaching: \u201cLet the game be the teacher.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a coach you can\u2019t set up a drill to teach a very specific thing that you may learn in one game situation. The better players that you\u2019re playing against, they teach you. The more exposure that kids can get playing at a level that they\u2019re challenged at, is really good.<\/p>\n

The big disadvantage that we have\u2014and it\u2019s a longer-term process\u2014is finding high-level competition [locally]. If you\u2019re in California and you\u2019re playing three games every single weekend and the competition level is good. They\u2019re playing in an environment where if they\u2019re not at their very best they\u2019re going to lose.<\/p>\n

[On the East Coast] any team that is going to win by 10 goals, it doesn\u2019t help anyone\u2014and it certainly doesn\u2019t help the winner. They develop bad habits and then you worry about the losers. Are they going to be discouraged?<\/p>\n

The more you\u2019re doing that against higher level competition the better. That\u2019s why California as a brand in our sport generally is considered another notch higher. That\u2019s because the ecosystem they have is not replicated anywhere else in the U.S.<\/p>\n

Is what you and others are building in Greenwich causing a ripple effect that raises the level of competition through the Northeast?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Without a doubt. And I certainly agree that the level in general is picking up. The main things that drive me are growing the sport and to bring it to a higher level. I would put that under the acronym of \u201cgrowth with quality.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kim, Ulmis and I started Tri-State<\/a> [an age group league for 12-U, 14-U and 16\/U18-U] because we don\u2019t have enough competition. As is often the case, Kim just went off and she did it. It’s her league\u2014she\u2019s great at executing.<\/p>\n

We did that to get competition for our kids, and when it first started it was very lopsided. The problem we always had is you have the eight, nine, 10, 12 year olds and everyone had to travel down to Navy and spend a weekend to play three games. We wanted to have something that was more local to lower the barrier to entry so that teams in New York City, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and wherever could compete. Connecticut is close. You can come up for the afternoon and be back home for dinner.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s all about getting more play time. Let the game be the teacher in different environments.<\/p>\n

I know from when I played, I worked and trained harder when I knew there was a competition coming up. It\u2019s the great motivator. And I do believe that it\u2019s helped some clubs sustain themselves, saying: \u201cWe\u2019re part of this league, now we\u2019re going to be showing up every other weekend with a boys or girls\u2019 team and compete.\u201d<\/p>\n

And then players start showing up for practice because they can see there\u2019s a structure to it. It\u2019s regular, close by, [and a] lower barrier to entry and more playing time.<\/p>\n

How do you feel that competition at Tri-State and JOs remains balanced given player and parental expectations about winning?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Going back to my two benchmarks of growing the sport and increasing the quality, clearly there are disparities within our own zone. I would put the zone qualifier at a different level than you\u2019d have at Tri-State, which is the work of the day. How do you get better, how do you move up those notches? It\u2019s a progression; doing it all the time.<\/p>\n

The number one thing we have to do as a club is to develop a water polo culture. That\u2019s where young kids are looking up to older ones thinking: \u201cThis is something I really want to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

The bottom line on all this stuff [is]\u2014all these other teams in the Northeast\u2014we\u2019re all brothers in the sport. The real competition, at least it is for us, is lacrosse, soccer, all these other sports that are capturing the attention of our kids. The youth sport market is extremely competitive.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re always trying to make our sport a better alternative, seen as having some cache.<\/p>\n

The true competition isn\u2019t at the JOs; it\u2019s against the other types of sports.<\/p>\n

If you can develop the culture\u2026 like when you go to Europe and on a Thursday afternoon you\u2019re in Croatia and you\u2019re playing on this makeshift field floating in the Adriatic Sea and all the neighbors pour out of the stores and they have drums and horns and they\u2019re cheering it on\u2026 [you think]; \u201cWow, this is so amazing!\u201d<\/p>\n

At Junior Olympics when you\u2019re playing in higher-level games and the whole crowd is going crazy and every single pass is important, every swim-off, every goal\u2014it\u2019s all so compelling.<\/p>\n

When you get to another level where they all have some basics down but it\u2019s the culture part of it where the players say: \u201cThis is something I really want to do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BY Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor The 2017 Junior Olympics Northeast Zone Qualification (NEZ)\u2014held last weekend in Greenwich\u2014was yet another example of how this tony Connecticut community has become the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4875,"featured_media":257799,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[17517,61751,8772,50272,61750,60192,61747,61748,61749,27247,60674,3613,12046],"class_list":["post-257786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-water-polo","tag-brooks-ensor","tag-carl-quigley","tag-greenwich-high-school","tag-junior-olympics","tag-kim-tierney-wang","tag-michael-randazzo","tag-mike-scofield","tag-mladen-stanicic","tag-terry-lowe","tag-thomas-dunstan","tag-ulmis-iordache","tag-usa-water-polo","tag-william-smith"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\nCatching Up with Bill Smith of Greenwich Aquatics - 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