Team USA women’s water polo’s devastating buzzer-beater loss to the Netherlands during the bronze medal game at the Paris Olympics marked the first time in history that Team USA was denied a medal and would be going home empty handed.
For LBCC water polo head coach Chris Oeding, the loss was a disappointing contrast to the two Olympic games prior where he helped coach Team USA to gold medals in Rio in 2016 and Tokyo in 2020.
It was the third time he attended the Olympics as a coach but he had already attended twice before as a Team USA water polo athlete in 1996 and again in 2000 where he served as the team captain.
So when he had the opportunity to assist Team USA for the third time with head coach Adam Krikorian in Paris, he couldn’t turn it down.
“It never gets old. The energy being there never gets old…(being at) the Olympic Village is like the closest thing we get to world peace,” Oeding said.
Since the Olympic village didn’t have the space to house every Team USA affiliate, he and his fellow coaches opted to stay in a hotel near the village to give new olympians experience of living amongst the most extraordinary athletes in the world.
“We were having a team meeting and we had Rafael Nadal walking by with (Carlos) Alcaraz and like here are two guys, one that is a legend in the sport and another guy that just won Wimbledon kind of following in his footsteps and they’re on a bus coming back to the village just like everybody else,” said Oeding.
Though he had been at the games multiple times by that point, this was the first time in years that his team played in front of a sold out crowd.
Attendance at the 2016 Rio Olympics was affected by the Zika virus outbreak in Brazil at the time and the political and economical controversies surrounding the games, which included thousands of poverty-stricken residents being displaced.
In 2020, the team played in front of nearly 4,000 empty stadium seats due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and Oeding compared the experience to being on an episode of The Twilight Zone.
Still, for Oeding and the returning six players from the Tokyo Olympics, playing in front of fans, family and friends again was exciting.
“It was incredible…to come back to a game that was much like I experienced as an athlete in Atlanta and Sydney where there were just sold out crowds and it’s just loud and it gives you energy, but at the same time it does distract,” Oeding said.
In 2013, he was named assistant coach of the USA women’s water polo national team and helped them dominate the world championship competition with five gold medals in six years.
He also coached the women’s water polo Olympic teams when they won Gold in both the 2016 Rio Olympics and 2020 Tokyo games.
When he was asked to accompany this year’s Olympic team to Paris, the expectation was to make history and be the first Olympic team to win four gold medals in a row. So it was even more shocking when Team USA came home empty-handed.
“I would say that if you ask people that watch water polo we didn’t perform to the level that we expected that we should have. This team is the most successful women’s water polo team in the history of women’s water polo. They were gold medal winners at the previous three olympics. So for us to get fourth and not medal was a disappointment,” Oeding said.
Though the team suffered multiple heartbreaking losses, they did not go down without a fight.
For the entirety of the games, they only trailed their opponents in points for one single second in thrillers against Spain and the Netherlands.
“We definitely had our opportunities but had a quarter in each of those games that were pretty catastrophic. Where we had momentum and all of a sudden it’s gone and we’re trying to get it back and we just never were able to recover from that,” Oeding said.
While the experience of playing in the games versus coaching is different, Oeding described feeling more pressure outside of the pool.
“I think you have more anxiety as a coach because you feel a little bit more helpless, you know. It’s not like as an athlete you have a direct impact in the game itself and you know what you’ve put into your preparation both physically and mentally and tactically. So you’re actually in the water able to make decisions that are going to impact the game, whereas as a coach you’re not. And so you’ve given them knowledge and tried to prepare them in all those areas but it’s up to somebody else to go out and take action,” Oeding said.
He noted that a big difference between coaching back home and coaching in the Olympics is dealing with the language barriers.
Coaches for other countries might know enough English to determine what plays and defenses Team USA will put in place, but the USA coaches have to do a lot of work in terms of strategizing around the competition.
”There’s so much that goes into it in terms of scouting and video, breaking down teams by player, position, their tendencies, what types of offense they run, what types of defense they run, what types of power plays they run, and what types of plays they run. So there’s so much depth that goes into that stuff,” Oeding said.
Another difference he recognized from when he was a player in the games was the influence that social media had on the athletes and the pressure it adds to perform well or risk being ridiculed by millions.
“That’s different from when I was playing because that was not around, but it’s something that you talk about what to expect at the Olympic games. A lot of them just kind of try to put their phone away and not listen to the noise so to speak. On the flip side of that, this generation is so used to social media that they’ll be able to take those types of criticisms with a little more levity. They’re not gonna let it completely affect the way that they’re playing,” Oeding said.
Social media, and Flavor Flav’s sponsorship of the team, also brought a whole new set of eyes to the sport and its players.
“I think that just bringing awareness and bringing a larger fan base to our sport, it’s such a niche sport that’s so kinda Southern California so a lot of people outside of the state don’t really even know what water polo is. Just bringing more exposure to us and the women themselves is giving them more opportunities for potential individual sponsorships and things for them,” Oeding said.
When his LBCC players saw the viral Tik toks of the sensational chocolate muffins from the village cafeteria the Olympic athletes were raving about, they begged their coach to try one and even sneak some back home.
“I love chocolate but it almost looked like it was too much chocolate. But it really was all it was cracked up to be. The chocolate muffin was spot on,” Oeding said.
Now back in the states, Oeding is coaching both of LBBC’s water polo teams and hoping to appear at this year’s State Championships that will be hosted at the new aquatics complex on campus.
“Working with Chris is the best in the world but it could also be intimidating… (he) has always given room to others as a coach and empowering everyone around him,” LBCC’s assistant water polo coach Bradley Adamson said.
Hailey Wadlington, a former player under Oeding and a volunteer who helps out the team during practices, said he’s the kind of coach who wants to see growth in everyone.
“Chris taught me what it means to love a sport… he wants everyone to love the sport but also work hard and be the best version of yourself that you can,” Wadlington said.
While the 2028 LA Olympics are still four years away, the work for USA women’s water polo to reclaim their spot on the Olympic podium is already in motion.
“Our head coaches already put together a post olympic checklist of like areas we can improve and it’s 2 pages single spaced. You just don’t know when it comes down to such slim margins. Is it tactical, is it physical… a lot of the time there’s not a lot that separates teams in the physical, it’s more the emotional and mental, and your ability to adapt in those situations where it’s high stakes,” he said.
Playing in front of a home crowd will definitely add pressure to perform well, but it will also add new excitement that could drive the team to work even harder this time around.
“Southern California is the mecca of water polo in the United States and it’s gonna be played in Long Beach so yeah it’s gonna be insane,” Oeding said.
Head Coach Adam Krikorian has yet to select his 2028 Team USA coaching staff, but Oeding said he’d love another opportunity to help coach the team back to another gold medal.
“I think we’ve got a good chemistry with the staff we’ve had through the years and I enjoy that working environment, so I would definitely be interested in talking about assisting again with Adam and being in his staff,” Oeding said.
In the meantime, you can catch Oeding at the LBCC Aquatic Center when his team faces Pasadena on Sept. 25.