Sandy Nitta - Episode 013

Hello, and welcome to PoloCast. This is just a quick note that these interviews were recorded in the summer of 2020. So if you hear any references that seem a little out of time, that's why. We're working hard to get these finished down to the world, but it does take some time so thanks for your patience and thank you for listening. Now let's start the show. This is PoloCast presented by the CWPA, a deep dive into the lives of prominent people in the water polo community with our host, George Gross Jr. CWPA Hall of Famer Doc Hunkler once stated that she is the mother of collegiate women's water polo. She is enshrined in the International Summing Hall of Fame and in 1998, became the first and only female coach to be inducted into the USA Water Polo Hall of Fame. USA Water Polo also named its annual Distinguished Women's Coach Awards after her. She received the 2012 Paragon Award for Outstanding Contribution to Water Polo. She has been involved in Water Polo all over the world. I am, of course, speaking about the legend herself, Sandy Neade. Sandy, thanks for agreeing to chat today on PoloCast. Well, thank you for having me. The pleasure is all mine and our listeners no doubt. Let's start, real easy, when and where were you born? I was born April 21st, 1949 in California, Burbank. And what was the light growing up in your household before you got to high school? I think it was kind of normal, you know? This is when you knew all the kids on the entire year block that you lived on, the next block, and the next block, you know, behind you. It was, you know, we'd come home from school, ride our bikes, play marbles, play hide and go see, kick the can, all of that stuff. So, it was pretty normal. Yes. And far different to what kids do today, and we'll get to that later in the show. So what was Sandy Neade of the elementary school kid like? I think I was pretty passive. I don't think my true personality came out until maybe I was in, until I started swimming seriously. And what was that? I started swimming in the 8th grade. So just before you got to high school? Yes. And which high school did you attend? Monabello Senior High School. This is now the school that a lot of the commerce kids graduate from. Okay. Do you remember what your first day there was like? Actually, I just came back from the Olympics, I missed a month and a half of school, and I remember that all my teachers gave me incomplete, except for my gym teacher. She gave me an F. So that kind of really turned me off into furthering my career as a physical education teacher. And then in fact, in my first year of swimming, high school, I got an F. Because when I swam the breaststroke, I did the whip kick, where your knees were together and your feet came out. And then your feet go out and all the way in, and I just couldn't change it. So, you know, she, she filled me in, in PE and swimming. That's got to be one of the great stories of all time, a teacher failing somebody who goes on to become an Olympian in that. This is after I came back from the Olympics. Yeah. Also, she even knew that. Yikes. So, it's incredible that you're an Olympian at age 15. And describe how that came about. You know, one thing that I'd like to say is, I never set a real goal for myself. When I was, when I started swimming seriously, it was one workout when my coach pulled me out and said, Sandy, you have a chance, I think it was in 62. I'd been swimming for about six months for him. And he goes, Sandy, you have a real chance of making the Olympic team. And I was like shocked, you're kidding. So from that day forward till I made the Olympics, that's all my goal was to make the Olympics. So once I made the Olympics, I had no other goals. I'm 15 years old. I did my job. So once I got on to the Olympics, I, you know, in training, I would fool around one time towards the end of the workouts, when my coach, Gabriel, came down to watch us at workout and he goes, what are you doing in the sprint group? And I, because I should be in the distance, because my stroke was 200 meters. And I said, well, that's a group that Peter Dellen put me in. And he was really shocked, but, and then I knew I should have been in the other group. But it didn't matter because I made my goal of making the Olympic team. So this is something that I've taught my kids to always have, you know, your immediate goals, your mid-range goals and your future goals. Okay. And, and how would you describe yourself as an athlete? You know, I, I think I was just a little bit ahead of time mentally, like they do all this mental toughness now. I used to do that when I was 13, 14, 15. I would close my eyes, I would picture myself, I would fill the water, I would fill my dive, I would fill my strokes, I would think about how I'm going to swim all of this. And it was the mental toughness that I think that got me through that. So it's, I, I just figured this out on my own. Everybody is going to sprint the last two laps of the 200. So my philosophy was sprint the 100 to the 150. So you get two laps ahead of them and then just come back as hard as you can for the last 50. And that's the way everybody's like, you know, you kind of sandbag it and save it for the end. I, you know, for only swimming competitively, seriously, for two years and for, for me to make the Olympic team, not bragging, but, you know, that was an amazing feat, you know, now that I think back and look upon it, you know, I'm 15 years old, I've been swimming for two years and, you know, I make the Olympic team. Well, you should be bragging because that, that, that's an incredible achievement. And, but I guess it's one that you kind of hide from your athletes because you don't want them thinking they only have to do this for over two years and get on the Olympic team. Right. Do as I say, not as I do. Exactly. I don't know any coaches that are like that, do we? So did you ever get into any trouble? You said you started to grow your personality, you know, in high school. You know, what we're, you know, I'm not looking for you, you know, going, breaking the law or anything like that, but were there any things that you did for fun or that, you know, got, you could have gotten into trouble? Yeah, you know, when we were on the Olympic team, when I was on the Olympic team, after we finished our swimming, the swim team took a tour around Japan and there was a diving and swimming exhibition. So one of the girls met me at 1000 yen, which was like 28 dollars, and to jump off the 10 meter tower. So I said, sure. So I climbed up there and I just figured I was going to go off, you know, between one of the dikes. Well, by the time I got up there, all the divers had stopped. They finished their exhibition and I was the only person up there. So I would walk out to the end of the platform and I looked down and everybody started clapping. Then I'd walk away and everybody kind of like, boo, boo, so then they talked me into jumping off that and I made 1000 yen for that. And you know how to milk a crowd, too. And I walked back and forth several times because I was scared. Yeah, I can imagine that. Now, you went to the Olympics, you came back. You obviously made the decision not to continue in swimming for another Olympics. Why? You know, I swung for three years and then the Olympic year, I decided to hang out my suit because that Olympic year was just so hard. We did so much training back then. And this was before, you know, a little bit before the swimming coach, Gamble, used to make a swim all the same sets, okay. And I was a breaststroke or so at the end of each workout, we would go 10, 25 freestyle. And everybody had to make it under 15 seconds. Well, I just couldn't do that, you know, not with these tight ankles, you know, I can't even kick, flutter, kick. So this one workout, I decided, well, you know what, I'm just going to loaf everything. I don't care, you know, let everybody do all these workouts. I mean, I even said, well, coach, let's go 10, 25s, breaststroke on 16 seconds and see how many people can make that. So this one workout, I swam three and a half hours of 25s until that was a morning workout, until my team came back and they got in for the evening workout. So then that changed coach's workout theme. So he had a sprint group, a middle distance, which was stroke, and then a distance group. And I would like to think that, and this is what swim teams do now, they have specialized group. And, you know, and this was way back in 63 that I did this and I think I might have helped coach change his way of thinking about the workouts. And you know, the workouts were really, really tiring. It was, it really took so much energy just to get up for the morning workouts. the afternoon, the evening weight training. And I just decided that one Olympics was good enough. Okay, and so now there's going to be no scholarship pursuing to university. So take us through the decision of where you were going to go to school after high school. Actually coach got me into it. He gambles started coaching at Long Beach State and he got me into Long Beach State. And that was only because there was a student world games coming up and you had to be registered in a four-year college. Then I was going to East L.A., which was a junior college. But then he got me registered in there. And then I didn't get my classes in time. So that went away. And then I just continued with junior college. It actually took me six years, seven years, to finish four years of college. And I think that was because of my physical education teachers that were so down on me because I was an Olympian. And I remember this one time, she was my high school teacher. She was showing us how to dig a volleyball. And she fell on her knees and I was in the front line. And I laughed. And she turned to me and she says, "Will you just wait till we get you in swimming? Don't think you're such a hot shot." And then that's how I got my F. [LAUGHTER] Okay. So, but you were pioneered already at 14, which has followed you through your life. So, switch gears a little bit. Our listeners can't see this. But I'm looking at you and there's a beautiful picture of a lake and there's a certain item in the photo frame, which I'm going to let you talk about because obviously has something to do with what you do to relax. So what are a couple of the things you like to do to relax? In the beginning, when I first started coaching the Women's National Team, there was no pay involved. So I used to play poker for a living. Like just the home games, Nickel Dine quarter, but we would play from Friday night to Sunday morning. And I would make about, you know, back then, 200 bucks I could live off of. I also had I owned apartments so that sustained some of my bills and stuff. So I would play poker. And that was for a living because who would give me a job coaching the National Team, taking off at Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, New Year's during the whole summer. So I started playing cards for a living. So that was one way I relax. The other way I relax is by going fishing. I am a very, very competitive person. And fishing is one of the things, I mean, I want to catch fish. But it doesn't burn my stomach that I'm not catching the most or the biggest. It's just so relaxing for me to fish. And that's why I have this picture of Lake Pangush in Utah where I usually go fishing. I mean, I was so competitive I had a friend from England come out and we're driving to the Oregon coast. And she goes, well, Sandy, slow down because I want to see some of the sights, you know, the trees and the little cabins along the side. And when I was slowing down this big ol' not in my stomach started coming down to this car started passing me. And I think, oh, Rose, I just can't do this. I didn't know I was this competitive. I can't stand these cars passing me. And she goes, what? You don't know that you're not competitive. Yeah, really. That's funny. So I'm interested by your comment you made. I kind of slipped it in there and I want to follow up on it. But I mean, you weren't very old and you're saying that I also own some motels or apartments. Yeah. What is that all about? So when I was working at the City of Commerce, I'm single, I'm making pretty good money. My, even the first couple of years that I was working, my parents would give me gas money, pay for my car insurance. So I just got to save all that money. And then my dad took my taxes to his tax guy and the tax guy says she needs to have a write-off. So I bought these apartments. And then later after I sold apartments and I moved out here to Vegas, I bought a mobile home park and that helped sustain my income. So basically, I worked at City of Commerce for like 12 years, I think. And that's probably the only real job that I've had. Okay. Now, you mentioned early on about playing tidley wings and marbles and hide and seek. And we know the kids don't do that today with all their video games. Is that something you're interested in? Now, I play games on my iPhone, my iPad, the computer, stuff like that. But, you know, even poker, I've lost my, okay, put it this way. I used to smoke cigarettes a lot, as soon as I finished swimming. And when I would play in a tournament, I would smoke probably two packs in one night of a tournament. So I was smoking up to three packs. So when I quit smoking, I lost my patience. And I just couldn't, you know, I would get very impatient. This one guy, I still remember clearly this one guy. He was drunk and he beat me in every single hand. If he had a flush, I had a flush. His was king high, mine was queen high. If I had a straight, mine was eight high. His was nine high, you know? And I just lost my patience. I just said, I'm finished with this. Just take my money. And I left the table. And since then, I played once in a while just for fun home games. But, you know, with my niece and nephews, I do play, you know, like we play pool games and we play the video games together. I've always been like a gamer. So, that kind of does interest me. Are you a little more patient now? Very much. Well, I think I'm more patient now. Yeah. Okay. Now, you are very well traveled throughout the world. And without getting into the water polo aspect of things, which places in the world have you been to that you like the most? So, when I travel, I don't go out and sightseeing. I don't go out and buy souvenirs. I buy souvenirs at airports. Usually, me and this couple of other team members, we would sit there and play cribbidge or gin, you know, card games like that. But then as soon as we got to this game called trivia pursuit, which is pretty, pretty far back. Yep. The team we started playing it. And it got me really interested in the geography about Great Britain's big band, you know, the London bridge, all these places that I've been. So then I did do a little bit of sightseeing. Probably one of the most enjoyable places. I think that I've been to and that really struck me was hungry. The first time we went to hungry, there was one McDonald's and it was like three blocks long to get in. There was one Adidas store that had maybe 60 people lined up to get in. One morning after morning workout, we asked the bus driver to take us to the grocery store. And there was nothing. Nothing left on the grocery stores. It was like, it was like the pandemic that we're having now, you know, no toilet paper and all this other stuff is gone. And then two years later, we went back and they had malls with the escalators. They had Wendy's up there. They had McDonald's all over the place. And what was surprising was like a school teacher in Hungary would make $128 a month. That's it. Wow. And then they had a TV which cost the same as what we would pay for, which was amazing. So Hungary got into, I know a lot of, a lot of those people just got, you know, they had credit cards for the first time. They, they must have just went bankrupt there. And to me, that was one of the most interesting countries I visited. And the Hungarians were always our friends when we played against them. But this way, when we played against other teams, Hungary was always our friend. And I'd say Australia was our friend. But none of the others are right. So are there any places you'd like to go to that you have not been to? I don't think so. I, you know, I've never been to China. And I thought I would want to go to China, but not nowadays. No, I think I've been to every place that I really want to be. I have visited. And you'll continue to make your pilgrimages to Utah to fish. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you talk as far as maybe I'll go back to Holland to visit a friend, but I'm still to visit friends. Okay. We need to step away for a short message after which we'll return with our second segment of Polo Cast. While I'm speaking with Hall of Famer and Water Polo legend, Sandy Needap. Now, you didn't play Water Polo in high school and you didn't play Water Polo in college. So how did you get into Water Polo? When I was swimming, Coach Gamber would give us two options doing our off time. One is to take stroke lessons. or want us to go play water pool. So I chose to play water pool. And it just happened. My coach was Nick Martin, who was on the Hungarian national team on that bloodbath. He coached at Pasadena College. And he was my first water pool coach. I mean, we hardly used our hands. It was all with the legs. We would turn our players with the legs. So if you're right in front of me, and I wanted to swim past you, I'd swim. I'd pick up the ball, and then I'd juggle the ball past you. Everything was with our legs. It was such a different game. So that's how I got into water pool. OK. Yeah. And then after that, Bert Shaw, who was the MIMS-- he's a peanut TWPC member. Then he was my first coach, Becky Shaw, was the manager and took us up to nationals and stuff. And that was very nice. OK. Let me take you back now. It's 1971, and you decide you're going to start a water pool program in the city of Commerce. What were some of the obstacles you faced? There wasn't many. Because when I first took over that job, I was the lifeguard, lifeguard instructor, pool manager, supervisor of aquatic. So when I changed the team from-- OK, so when I started my novice team, I had like six players. Within a month, I had 60 players. We worked out in this four-lane, 20 yard pool, hot, like 92 degrees. It was the baby swimming pool. And then from there, I went to AU. And then-- so what happened is one-- we used to swim year round. And then one year, I said, you know what? I'm going to give these kids a two-week break. So when I gave them the two-week break, the city has so many other sports. They join football, basketball, you know, all these other clubs that they can join. And I probably lost half of my team. So the following year, the break was going to be water pool. And I started a water pool team. And I remember I just had a broomstick, a pair of white, blossom-found white underwear, could a blue towel nail them to a stick sat on the high diving board to referee. Our cages were these plastic trash cans that we filled with water and put them on the deck to make goals. And that's how we started. And the next-- Next round of all. Yeah, parents were-- they made goals for us. This one welder, he made us goals. I got the city to buy like two balls and two balls. And, you know, that was it. And then I remember our first tournament that I took the kids to. This one girl, Carmen goes, Sandy, what are those? And I said, those are goals. And she goes, they use trash cans. [LAUGHTER] That's amazing what experience, you know, different experiences for different people. And so tell us about the City of Commerce who's involvement in the program. You mentioned you were in a really small pool, but you were working for the city. But what are the details about how the City of Commerce supports? They-- OK, back when I was-- I also swam for them. And they paid for all of our nationals. So they paid for our flights, our hotel. They gave us meal money. They paid for a pool time. We just had to pay coach a little dues and stuff. And then when I stopped, then I started working there. And I started this team. It was kind of what we're going through today, the Black Lives Matter. It's like back then, it was like the Brown Lives Matter. They come from a poor neighborhood. So the first thing I asked the City to do was buy them sweats, because some of these kids would come to the tournament. Well, they would have a big bus for us and drive us to the swim meets. And I'd have the City buy us sweats so they can look presentable when going to the-- to the swimming. So we would meet at the pool. All the kids get on the bus. We'd come back. All the kids get off the bus. And then I asked the City for some lunch money to make sure all the kids could eat. Then as we got older, things got a little more difficult. I remember our girls' team playing against an Orange County team. And two of the younger girls came out at the pool deck and said, Sandy, that team is singing the Mexican Hat Dance. And Iris and Des, you know, two of my older players, they want to go in their bite. I said, go in there and call all the girls out. So they called all the girls out. And I said, you don't touch them. You don't touch them. You just stand behind Des and Iris, who are the biggest girls. And you ask them questions. And so then after that, they backed off, because we stood as a team. The same thing happened to my voice team. When we were at the LA Coliseum, they wanted to start a fight because we beat them. Another incident was when we were on a swim team, and we went to Scottsdale, not Scottsdale, Arizona. There was these three guys walking along, and they saw our two vehicles full of Mexican Americans. And they started calling us names and stuff. So I had the boys, and I pulled the station away and off to the side, and I told the boys, do not touch them. Just go out and scare them. So you have these eight nine boys going out running and yelling. And these other boys are running. One ran into a car at a stop sign. Another kid took off and was really fast. And I think this last kid, he still may be running. But it just shows you how far water pole has come with the commerce kids. The commerce kids are now very well respected. They walk in and pull and everybody goes, oh, there's those commerce kids. One other thing that I did when we were the city cars, because they got everything free, like when we went to Hawaii, airfare hotel, vans, gas, meals, my pay, the entry fee, sweats, t-shirts. So instead of just always getting, I didn't want the kids to think that it was going to always be this easy. So I made the kids do fun razors each year. The first year, I think we raised $1,600. And back then, $1,600 was a lot for the United Way. We did a swimathon. We've done a passathon. We've done other fun razors and stuff. Just so the kids got a sense of also getting back. Yeah, and it's important our listeners understand the normal view is fun razors is you're raising funds for yourself. But in this case, you had your team raising funds for others. Yeah, because we, at the time, we didn't need it, but everything paid for ourselves. Pretty amazing that city of commerce paid for all this stuff. Because I mean, our listeners are out there going, my city would never have done that, and certainly today, I don't know if any city does that anywhere outside of commerce. How has this impacted the youth in the area? Oh, greatly. I mean, you have Brenda Villa, graduating from Stanford. You have all these commerce kids. They all go to D1 or D3, and they continue to play in college. A lot of them are in the D1 schools. They've also, they all have good jobs now. They take their studies very, very seriously, because they know that is the next step in their chain of events. OK. So city of commerce is giving to you. You've got your team giving back to charities. But you also gave back to the city of commerce, brought it some publicity, because you brought the first-ever women's international water polo tournament to the city of commerce. How did that idea come about? And what was it like trying to make it happen? So Gina Watz, who is also Hungarian. You know Gina? Oh, yes. OK. Gina Watz, not a more colorful character was in water polo. In fact, you know what? He lives in Las Vegas now. And I saw him about three years ago. Yeah, he's doing pretty good. Good to hear. Gina Watz contacted me at the city of commerce and invited us to Canada. And we just paid for our airfare. They paid for hotel, our van rental, and our food, and all the wards we got and stuff. So then after that trip, I reported back to the city council. And I told them what they gave me and what they did for us. And one of the councilmen said, well, Sandy, what would it take for us to run a tournament? So come back to the next council meeting and bring us a budget and what your plans would be. So my plan was like a cake and punch and awards and referees. That was it. And they said, no, let's do a little bit more for them. What if I want a budget where we pay for their hotel, all their ground, all their food, their sightseeing. And this budget ended up to be like $60,000. We invited-- we had 16 teams. We had Holland, Mexico, I think three Canadians. teams, Australia, US teams, a couple of club teams. And from there, we met with all the leaders of the different countries. And we said, okay, well, next year or two years, let's see if we can get another major tournament. So that was the phenocop 1 and we're said which had Holland, Australia, New Zealand, and the US and Canada. And from there, it just took off. Well, it's another pioneering move by you and certainly tremendous honor for City of Commerce. You mentioned international. So let's slide over there. In the late 70s, you served as the USA Women's International Chair. How did you get to that position and what were the things you tried to do? I don't know. I guess I was the next, I think that was maybe the second year that we had this committee. And the former chair of that was now the women's head coach. So he gave that up. And then I was elected. And in that, what we did is we formed a not only inner, we formed a group of people like Mia from Holland, Claude LaVoy from Canada, Dominic Dion from Canada, Paul Gear from all these countries. And we started getting the teams together and we started promoting within trying to get FINA. So FINA finally recognized this as a Women's Subcommittee, which was good. And we had input on like, and we introduced the smaller ball for the women, the shorter course. Because in the beginning when women started, we played in a 30 meter course with a 35 second shot clock. And the men played in a 25 meter course with a 45 second shot clock. So we got those things changed around. We started making the desk more responsible where they'd have a TWPC member behind each person making sure the table was run properly and it just bloomed from there. Well, another pioneering moment. What was it like? I mean, you step from there into the national team coaching job and you were there for a long time. Can you talk about what the team did because it wasn't well-funded and you had to be somewhat creative? How did you and the players make the program work? So the first year I was the coach, the number one thing I did is I made money talks and you know what walks. So I made every girl pay $50 just to be on the team. And then it won't give that to the manager and she'd bank it all this. And then we would train during Christmas and New Year's. We train Easter week. We train all summer. If there was any other time that we could go northern in Southern California, we would do that. But basically, all the girls paid for their own couple of years. We did fundraising like when we were in Italy, we were selling t-shirts in the stands to help pay for our way. And this is when all the other countries like Holland, they were self-sought. They were funded. Canada had some sort of funding. They didn't have to do the fundraising that we did. Australia had the funding. New Zealand had the funding. Italy definitely had the funding. So it was really hard like when we would go on a training trip. So I would set it up where we would lend and say we were in Holland. We'd land in Holland. We'd go to one pool. We'd stay overnight in their clubhouse. So that meant us sleeping on pool tables or on the ground. You know, it wasn't beds or anything. And then waking up, getting into the van, taking the kids to the next city where we're going to a little bit sightseeing. And then play a game that night. After we'd play a game, they'd usually have a dinner for us. Then we'd sleep on their pool tables or rec room or their gyms. And you know, this one time, Holland put us in this incised and this camp, this training camp, but it was a camp outside of the training camp. And it was like out in the woods. And it was like a camp snoopy. It was like log cabins. But that was really fun because they had a big kitchen and a big living room, big old table where all the girls were playing games and talking. And I mean, really communicating and not, you know, this is when they didn't have their phones and stuff. And they would leave a vat of beans every morning for us for breakfast. And then we go out and do our own shopping. And we cook, you know, like three people as cooks, four people cleaning up, you know, so we work in shifts as who had to do what. And it was really a team bonding thing. I don't think I would trade that. Those are some of the best experiences. What was Sandy Neeta, the coach like? Well, what I think and what the players think maybe take two different things. Well, you have the platform right now. Yeah. I think I was pretty tough on them. I know, like when I was swimming, if I was the coach of myself, I probably would have thrown me off the team. But you know, the girls were pretty much at least when I was coaching them, I didn't know about half the things that they did until after the fact that I'm still learning now. You know, they were they were all pretty good, you know, and I think we were pretty intense. The amount of players that we had to pick from was like just over 200 throughout the United States. And that's from an age grouper to somebody in college. And for us to have that small of a group and do that as well as we did, I think we I think we did all right. You know, I I think I was very I had an imagination like the Canadian women's coach right now. He does a two goalie thing once in a while. Well, I was doing two goalies in the in the 80s. A lot of teams when they're down a man, they go three goalies. I was doing that in the 80s. You know, just just a little bit different or the two goalies was almost the same. But the three goalies like when one in six, if they walk the ball in, I'd have this one goalie walk out because if that one player walking in so close, I don't care if there's 10 arms up, they can still make it through. So we kept them out. And then we still have two goalies in the water. So more pioneering. Yeah, I you know, I remember the first time I was watching a US US hungry game and hungry went to three goalies. And if comp the announcer was saying, oh, look, they're doing something new. They get three goalies. And then right after that, oh, I'm mostly out about 10 checks. Oh, my God, they're like 20 years behind Sandy. And really, now you were you were part of the push to get women's water polo into the Olympics. And you were the coach of the US team throughout much of the 90s, but you didn't stay on for that first hurrah. What happened? Um, you know, it was just time, I think 18 years was or 17 years. And then one other year was was plenty. And I think by having Guy Baker take over that position, I thought he did a really good job. He took it from a mom and pop type of business into a professional business. I'm hoping that I would have been able to do that, but I'm not 100% sure that I could have with my mindset of being poor or poor or, you know, always fighting for the underdog, the under, you know, I mean, the commerce, Vegas, you know, it's always been the underdog with Brazil. So I just, you know, I did run for it. I didn't make the position. And in hindsight, I'm glad I didn't. I think Guy did a fantastic job. In fact, later on in my career, I started working for Guy in the ODP where I was in charge of all the western, everything west of, or east of California, all the way out to Oklahoma. I was in charge of all that waterfall. And he, you know, I can't say enough about Guy. He's, he, he's learned that set all of this. I think this is why the women's team is this successful because of the steps that Guy took. All right. It's time for another brief message. And then we'll be back with the final segment of Polo Cast. Polo Cast is sponsored by CWPATV. From live events to on demand CWPATV.com is your one stop shop for all of your collegial water polo action. CWPATV has grown over the past few years, providing more than double our previous coverage of live water polo games and tournaments for free. Create a free account and you have instant access to games and tournaments from across the country wherever you are in the world. Visit collegialwaterpolot.org during the season for our streaming schedule. And be sure to check out CWPATV.com to catch your friends, family, or alma mater in action this season. (upbeat music) - I'm speaking with Hall of Famer and Water Polo Legend, Sandy Nita. Now, you did mention just now fighting for the underdog and you slipped in the word Brazil there. Tell us a bit about that experience, how you got there, why, and how it went. - So, way back in the early 80s, we invited Brazil to come out and play in one of our tournaments. And I met the manager and Pedro Pinto-Roli, who was a three-time Olympian for Brazil, his daughter plays and is still involved. And then she told me this after the fact she said, one of these days, I'm gonna get this Japanese lady to come over to Brazil and she's gonna be our coach. This was what, 18 years after the fact. So, she asked me, I finished my, spent with the US team and so I just went out there and I'd be there a month and come back here for three weeks, go out there for six weeks, come back for two weeks. And the training was, it was really easy. They were, I didn't have to teach game sense to those Brazilians because they all followed soccer and they know the game were teaching here in the US. There's so many kids that don't even watch football or basketball or understand what a pick is. This and that. So you have to teach all of that to the US players. But in Brazil, it was so easy because they got it. I just had to teach them probably the mental toughness, the defense of the game, they're all about offense. Maybe controlling their emotions because they're pretty emotional, controlling their emotions just a bit and defense. That's probably the biggest thing that I taught them is how to play defense. - And what were a couple of your highlights? - Probably the number one highlight was the 99 Pan American Games. It was the first time the women's were entered in the Pan American, or officially in the Pan American Games. And we beat the United States. That was probably my all-time favorite. And not that I hated the United States, but it was just a pride taking this country, this third-world country and beating a powerhouse. - Well, it's certainly a great achievement because with the resources available, et cetera, and the experience, that's a huge accomplishment, especially at a big competition like the Pan Ames. And so I want to sidestep return to something we talked about earlier, but a little bit more detail. And that is your involvement with poker. And our listeners, okay, she played a little poker. You didn't play just a little poker. So why don't you tell us about your whole poker career, how you got started to be not playing as a youngster, but when you decided, you know what, I'm going to be a professional poker player. So I started knowing that being the national team coach, I needed some type of income. So then the women started these poker tournaments way before the men. They would have these maybe five, six-table buy-in or, you know, poker tournaments on them. I mean, I went to a poker tournament every single night, seven days a week. And so from there, when came the World Series, you know, I placed in the World Series seven-card stud. I placed in probably one of the best games I was ever in is there was three professional poker players. One was his name, the guy from Texas, anyhow, it was a seven-handed game. The pot was huge in this tournament, huge. So I started off with two jacks in the home. This is seven-card stud and it went back up. So I started with three jacks. And then there were splashes on the table. There were full houses on the table. So it went down and the biggest pot of the night, whoever won that was going to win the tournament. And so on my last card down, I get another jack and I have four jacks. And throughout the tournament, all these men are calling me, oh, sweetheart. Hey, what about this sweetheart? Oh, honey, this, you know, being just a little bit degrading. And so when it came down to declaring who had what, the one guy would go, well, I have a flesh nine-hine. I have a flesh keen-hine. I have a flesh ace-eye. And so they go, I have a full house. Six is hot, six is full. And then the guy goes, I got nine is full. And so they go, I have kings full. And then they go, well, what do you have, honey? And I go, I have two pair. And they go, well, what are you doing in this pot? I go, no, no. I have two pairs of jacks, two red ones, and two black ones. [LAUGHS] That's a great line. All-time favorite, favorite pot that I've ever won. And how did they react to that? I think they're still picking up their jaws. Now, interesting. Do you use your, did you and do you use your skills from coaching when you play poker and vice versa? Do you use poker skills when you're coaching water polo? Yes, both, goes both ways. So when I'm coaching, I may be, I'm supposed to look angry, but it's actually making me laugh what they did. And I can't go up to them doing a game and start laughing at the situation. I gotta be serious. So that's like that. And on the reverse side in a poker game, I've learned to not always be that serious. Look a little afraid, like I don't have anything. So it's the poker face, the tail. Yeah. Now, that's interesting. Now, besides coaching, you're also now heavily involved in refereeing. And I'd like to talk about your collegiate work specifically. What have you been doing on the college level and what are some of your future goals? So I worked for the MPSF, which is L. Beard is the commissioner. He's probably the best boss ever. It's basically whatever I'm asking for. He gives it like one of the first things that I wanted to do. First, I was an evaluator, not an assigner. I would evaluate these referees. And I would see some of these top-notch referees making misapplications of the rules. And what was their punishment? Well, their punishment was they got to go referee at the NC2As. I mean, you know, that's not much of a punishment. Really? So that was the first thing that I installed in the MPSF is accountability. So if you make a mistake, you're going to be held accountable for. And I'll not say that we're going to strip them away. But what I want them to do is I want them to be able to take responsibility for their actions. You take responsibility. Then you've learned your lesson. You don't take responsibility. You never learn. And you're never going to improve. So that was one thing. The other thing was when I came in, they have all these top referees, top-notch referees, that always get all the good games, OK? And there was a lot of middle referees stuck in there for like 10, 12 years, that never made it up to the top. So in the last three or four years, I made moves where we don't have the league five, or the fantastic five anymore. We have maybe 15 referees that can handle any game. So I've taken a lot of those middle referees and given them chances to move up. The other thing I've done is comes with the little story when I was on the US Waterhole Board of Directors. Ramsey gave me a pass to one of the women's collegiate nationals. And I'm sitting in one of the bleachers behind the table. And these two female referees are talking. And one of the referees goes, I think I did OK. But for me to get a final, I know I had to be perfect. And I heard that. And I just said, what are you talking about? You don't have to be perfect. The men aren't perfect. So then I started working towards moving, making sure that the females also got a fair shot. And since then, I think we've moved. Well, Danielle DeVasian, she's the first female referee to referee a men's NCAA championship, which is very high. And things that I would like to do in the future is make it-- so I'm not saying they're going to get paid like these basketball or football referees yet. But something a little bit more substantial. I think within the MPSF, we are one of the best paint. We pay the most per game. We give not only mileage, but the drive time. So Lynn Whitstock works two miles away from Cal. When she goes down there to evaluate, she makes $25. So from 1 to $25 miles, she makes $25 going, $25 miles back. Danielle who lives in San Diego when she comes down to SC and she's got to leave you know it's a five o'clock six o'clock game she's got to get you know she's a mid-morning she's driving down there so she doesn't hit traffic so it's an all day thing so if it's a hundred miles she'll get a hundred dollars there and back plus her game fee plus per dem just the name a few we've given out we we had a official pass away a couple years ago Craig Rockhold and we named the the MPSF referee after the Craig Rockhold award just little tiny things that we're trying to do trying to make it fair for everybody and not just cater to the top you know the same guys that if you look at the resume it's probably three or four guys that have all done the NC2A finals and you know there's probably another 15 guys or ladies that could could do those finals and and now we're we're opening it up more well that's great to hear and and that work is obviously going to have a major impact on people's desires to become referees and and stay referees with more and more opportunity and better treatment and and the account of Italy part is also really important because you know people you and I both know this shouldn't be allowed to progress you know Peter principle or you know or buddy system I think our listeners are probably sitting there going right now oh man she started off with this local involvement in commerce and now she's national team international administration nationally administration internationally conference stuff but you are still doing a heck of a job locally and and I and I want our listeners to know that it didn't stop with commerce that you've impacted Vegas and Portland and now Vegas again can you tell us a bit about that whole local involvement and and what you're trying to do so here it is again the underdog you know here in Vegas we don't have any high school waterfall we are it there's no other waterfall in Nevada that's it and this might be an advantage so when we go to a tournament and they don't know who Vegas is that's good for about two maybe three goals because they're taking us lightly and then you know I think I like to make my workouts harder than the game you have to be more intense than the game because we may only get 10 games a year that are really good where the California teams get at least 15 20 games a month that are really good that they're playing in right so our workouts need to stem from from hard intense work at workout treat it like a game we've had a lot of players go on to play in college also some of my Brazilian players or Brazilian connections have gone on to to play in the men's and women's D1 schools and it's a I don't know I I think I'm just you know I'll say thing with Oregon I mean Oregon had high school waterfall but the games and stuff aren't that intense or that good that they get a plan so like the first year I was coaching there they have some really good athletes up there we entered in this John Hale tournament which was the big tournament before junior Olympics our girls were seated last our boys were seated second to the last so in our first game we played Long Beach which was this number one seat well we beat them okay within in the final they found a backdoor to come back to play us in the final and we beat them so from seated last to second to the last was I mean big time in one of the players who's gonna be in a inducted in the Hall of Fame LC wines she was on that team and then on our boy side we were missing our main center matley he was up training with the pepper dine because he was going to college there and we had to play this Hungarian team and the night before or Thursday night before the tournament started we scrimmaged them they must have beat us like by 12 15 goals and until I saw their center hook like this oh my god he's just trying to draw foul this is what kata from the women's Hungarian team used to do so I so I'm not going to send out drops right so that's how they were killing us from their outside shots so we pressed and we beat them by two goals to come to the finals and our boys were just so pooped without a center you know we got second in that but coming from last to first and second to the last to the second was was a incredible achievement and major and major swing in goals too from losing by 12 to 15 and then winning I mean that's a huge turnaround you know at the same tournament I guess I could go on and on about almost everything you know you do in water polo but I never get there so I'd like to wind things down by talking about the sport and I'd really like to let our listeners in on some of your thoughts especially on collegiate water polo so what do you see happening right now in collegiate water polo but the pandemic or just in general just in general you know I I think the NC2A went away from phenol rules they said we're going to do this and then Tina started liking some of our rules and adopting some of our rules and now I think we're coming back and we're going to start adopting some of their rules mark kogan off who's a referee back eastings also the vice president of the TWPC he's doing amazing things with the new rules the evaluations the whole thing he's turning I think everything around and I think the NC2A is ready again to maybe take some of the rules that the phenol has and put them into the NC2A rules I think that especially with the CWPA with all the teams that they have you know I think that CWPA is above and beyond what anybody could even imagine could happen here in the United States so I think you know dandas a terrific job of administrating all of his leagues all the info he gets out you know ed read with all his videos and you know he's going off he's kind of in his own he has his own rules rules tests for his referees is which is different from the NC2A and I think that's something that we as the NC2A should be looking at as a model with the CWPA does are there any rule changes or any competitive scenario changes you'd like to see there's a couple minor like where when you get your yellow red card that the coach can only go up to two meters you know and the coach is standing at two meters and the play is down at the other end and the other coach is going hey he's passed the two meters you know you can't even see where he's standing of course just make him sit down and you know if he's standing up right right I'd like to see it become just a little more stricter on the coaches about how they treat officials I think some of our officials especially some of the rookies you know it's just not right to to scare them away you know and some of these guys can take it and some of these guys even love it you know to be yelled at oh you know just the way they they treat officials and I understand the coaches side because that's that's part of their job is to try to get the calls you know I mean maybe in a coach I know that so I know what the coaches are doing to the referees trying to get those calls but some of them taking a little bit too far just to be a little more respectful also the counter attack I really dislike after there's a shot in the center in the center defender are together and there's all this wrestling going on and the referee just goes like this waving him on yeah like separate them call something you know I remember I think you know Jack Horton yes he years ago years ago he goes I saw him at a jails and he goes so Sandy what do you think about this launch off I go what's the launch off he goes where the center or center defender launches off the other person what do you think should happen I go call it so after I came back from Brazil I coach at a jails and I go they can't do that they have the ball up like this and their hand is on their chest hold in them away right picture in the rule book that says you can't do that and they're allowing them to do that so I don't like this and the nc28 we are getting away from that but the launch off at the counter attack I think just call it on whoever you think just just to stop that. Because if you're a parent of a ten-year-old and you're watching like the NCAA's or senior national team play and, you know, they're kicking off like that, would you want your daughter or son in a sport like that? No. I think we're scaring a lot of potential players away. Yeah, I agree with that. And one of the things that, you know, is a scenario here is that if you don't call stuff and you let it go on, it's only going to get worse. But if you do call it, people are going to complain for a while. I use the example, you know, from my background, is that, you know, when the national hockey league decided to stop the clutching and grabbing in the neutral zone, coaches and players complained bitterly for three months and the parade to the penalty box was non-stop because the league administrators said, "Do it." Well, eventually everybody adapted and now the game of hockey today is so fast and there's none of that clutching and grabbing. So it's the same with that center, you know, Ruckus going on on the counter attack. But one other thing, you know, that I've always had discussions about and that is the suit grabbing and women's water polo. I'd like to know your thoughts about that. You know, it's very frustrating as a coach. I mean, there's a clip that Adam Wright sent me of Corley at UCLA. She got the cone. She went up to Larissa who was referring and she banged the cone on the deck and Adam goes, "Now, how can she be able to do that?" And I explained to Adam that she was banging that cone because her players kept holding the suits, you know. So she's mad at her players were holding suits and I think that if we keep calling it, you know, I think it's getting better, you know, there's a couple of players or there's all kinds of players that do a lot of holding. I think there's a couple of referees that catch them and they know. So soon as the ball gets around them and they know that that referee is going to call in their area, they put up their hands because they know that referee is going to call. If another referee is there, their hands are under the water holding and I think that's like your hockey. I just think it needs to be called a little more and, you know, there is so much to grab. But they can learn. You can learn. Oh, anything can be unlearned if you have to and, you know, it's unfortunate that people just don't want to draw the line in the sand and stick to it because it would make the game so much more enjoyable to watch because, you know, what do you want to see? You know, in your coach and people want to see movement. People want to see combination plays, you know, people don't want to watch wrestling. So it's just a matter of just lay down the lawn and call it 100% of the time and if teams file out all their players before the end of the game, so be it. Next time they'll think twice. You know, it's like they used to call, well, it used to be drivers and they called them attackers. Well, I think you can now call them drivers again because the last two years we've cleaned up all these hand checks, all these, you know, and they're now driving a lot more and they're swimming around center. I mean, there's a lot more movement. That's another case of like the hockey. Now one interesting thing about water polo technically and that is, with the refereeing scenario, myself and some others have talked about this and we're not, I mean, we laugh when we talk about it, but we're serious. And that is male referees, refereeing women's games and not really understanding in my opinion and several other people's opinion exactly how much goes on in the game even though they intellectually know it, they don't know it. And so the idea we floated is that when the referees go through their certification courses at some point and probably renewable times as well, they should have to get in the water where a women's suit and then have high level women's players show them like an in-scriminate situation, not just stand there and do it, but get in a scrimmage situation and let them feel how many times they're being grabbed, where they're being grabbed and what situations they're being grabbed so that they're better capable of, okay, I know that happened and making the calls. I mean, what do you think about that idea? That, very interesting, I think it would be good, I don't know how many referees would put on a women's suit and get in the water, but even if they were out of the water and they had a suit, you know, what was it maybe four years ago, I saw this in a US Australia game where the Aussie girl, the US girl filed her on the wing at the flat and then the Aussie girl went underwater, she grabbed the US girl's suit here, pulled her into her, and made it look like she was interfering with the fleet and got excluded, you know, and now I think they're being copped on more and you are true, you are right, you know, I think some of the better referees who referee women's game are maybe three or four, let's say one, two, probably three of our top female referees do a really good job at that and know everything like the boys are, you know, she's spinning but she grabbed the suit here. Right. Very tricky. Well, it is a tough question and probably going to be debated for a long time. This has been a great talk, if I had to describe Sandy Nida to someone who did not know you, what would I tell that person? I think that I am a loyal person, people who are loyal to me, I am loyal back, no matter what the circumstances is, I love the game of waterfall, it's my life, I'm always for the underdog and I will put countless hours into whatever task I'm asked to do. Well said, she is a member of the International Summing Hall of Fame and the USA Water Polo Hall of Fame, an Olympic athlete in swimming who went on to an incredible 50 plus year career in all facets of water polo that's ongoing, Sandy Nida has been my guest today on polo cast, Sandy thanks so much for taking the time to be on her CWPA podcast series. Thank you George. It's been a pleasure while I do hope our listeners now understand the magnitude of just how much you were able to impact water polo in general and women's water polo in particular. Until next time on polo cast, this is George Gross Jr. wishing all our listeners the very best in and out of the pool. This is polo cast presented by the CWPA with new episodes twice a month, be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.