'Tough love' coaching style prompts abuse concerns on Stanford's water polo team

In the world of water polo, three things ring true: It's exclusive, expensive and everyone seems to know each other. So, when Stanford University began investigating its men's water polo coach, Brian Flacks, the school's water polo community took notice. When Stanford began its second investigation into Flacks, the water polo community took sides.

The battle over Flacks' coaching style centers on what constitutes "tough love" versus "toxic" behavior. One faction says the battle is about what it alleges are Flacks' abuse, retaliation and demands for loyalty. Another faction blames the controversy on parental interference, players' dissatisfaction over playing time and an inability to cope with the rigors of collegiate play.

It has raised an age-old question: Do intense, overwhelming tactics make a team better, or do they tear a team apart?

"Historically, coaches were very much more dictatorial: You do this because I told you," said Tim Baghurst, director of Florida State University's Interdisciplinary Center for Athletic Coaching, which advises coaches on leadership best practices. "Now this generation of athletes do not necessarily respond well to that kind of instruction. They may want to know why, they may want to have the coach understand their feelings or situation or what they're going through."

The Stanford controversy surfaced last September when the university received a formal complaint from two parents about Flacks' coaching style. It caused Stanford to engage outside counsel Kate Weaver Patterson to investigate allegations of emotional and verbal abuse and pressuring athletes to play despite serious injuries. She is the same attorney who investigated misconduct allegations against Troy Taylor, the school's former head football coach. Taylor was dismissed in March after ESPN revealed details of two investigations that were prompted by complaints from staffers who said he bullied and belittled them.

In Flacks' case, Patterson determined there was "insufficient evidence to find that any athlete's treatment was outside of Stanford athletics and sports medicine procedures" and "no intent by [Flacks] to create an unhealthy environment," according to a Feb. 13 letter to Flacks from then-athletic director Bernard Muir.

"However, the investigator did find that your intensity and drive can be reasonably perceived by players as overwhelming," Muir wrote, noting Patterson's recommendations of language adjustments and monthly mentoring on managing the pressures of the job.

But in April, Stanford launched a second investigation after parents and players, including the original complainants, alleged Flacks retaliated against athletes who might have cooperated with the first investigation. The results of the second investigation, which was first reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, have not been released.

ESPN submitted multiple requests to interview Flacks, but a Flacks representative -- unaffiliated with Stanford -- insisted that written questions be submitted in advance. ESPN declined.

Flacks' attorney, Rebecca Kaufman, characterized the first investigation has having "fully exonerated" Flacks and, in a statement, said that "any allegations of retaliation against players are as preposterous as they are false."

A Stanford University spokesperson said the school "expects all of our coaches to work diligently to develop a culture of positivity, respecting the health and well-being of our student-athletes, and to embrace constructive feedback for improvement."

The university also noted that Patterson, in the first investigation, did not find any evidence of an "unhealthy environment."

WHAT MAKES THIS fight so unusual is the very public and messy battle that has emerged in this largely insular, exclusive sport. Harvard, Princeton and Brown are among the 28 Division I schools offering men's water polo. But it's the California schools -- Stanford, UCLA, USC and the University of California-Berkeley -- that tend to attract the top talent. Of the 13 men's water polo Olympians representing the United States at the 2024 Paris Games, all but one attended a big-four California school.

Players, parents and coaches interact year after year at tournaments, games and events, with a major goal of getting players into the Olympics. The reputations of all matter. Word can get around fast, with worry that criticism of coaches can affect the careers of athletes at an elite university with a powerful alumni base.

The fear among players is "not only will I not play, but all these alumni will ruin me," one former elite Stanford water polo player told ESPN.

When the fight at Stanford spilled into public view, a few players quit the team. Friendships split among parents. Lawyers and public-relations professionals were hired.

Multiple players still on the team -- supporters as well as critics of Flacks -- told ESPN the team, tied for third nationally in the final 2024 Collegiate Water Polo Association rankings, is in disarray. The investigation and its aftermath created stress with teammates who don't know whom to trust. Practices are observed by a school official. The players say the drama is affecting recruiting efforts as word spreads about tensions on the team.

Among recruits' questions: whether Flacks will still be the head coach next season.

ESPN reached out to nearly four dozen people and spoke with 25 to learn about the disputes that have torn the team apart. Most spoke only on condition of anonymity. Even those long removed from the day-to-day activities of the team said they feared retribution.

"No one wants to talk," said another alumnus and former elite player, describing the community as "paralyzed by fear."

But several defenders of Flacks called his style "intense." In an interview with the university student newspaper, The Stanford Daily, parent Danielle Pittman called it "tough love" and compared the coach to former Alabama head football coach Nick Saban. Her son, Riley Pittman, was one of five players who chose to play their fifth and final year under Flacks in the 2024 season.

Both mother and son suggested the complaints boiled down to players' unhappiness over playing time.

"Division I sports, especially at this level, is very difficult. It's very competitive, and not everybody's going to be happy, and that's unfortunate. But the fortunate thing is that there's this thing called the [transfer] portal," Danielle Pittman said.

Riley, the team's captain during the 2024 season, credited Flacks with "helping develop my game more than any coach has ever done. He's taught me so much about leadership and how to be a better person, a better man."

Daniel Mnatsakanian played for Flacks in high school and now at Stanford. "He is a coach who unconditionally cares for his players," Mnatsakanian said. "He is an incredibly difficult coach to play for because he demands excellence, and he demands you to be the best. And I am eternally grateful for him."

Many who support Flacks pointed to the same "three families" they said are unhappy.

But seven current and former players or their families confirmed to ESPN that they raised issues with Stanford about Flacks' coaching style. They all asked not to be named for fear of retaliation. They described a culture of isolation and psychological warfare, where players were discouraged to speak with each other or their parents about the state of the team.

Players told ESPN that Flacks froze them out, belittled them and called them names such as "bottom-feeders" and "victims." The San Francisco Chronicle quoted parents making similar remarks.

One player described Flacks' coaching style to ESPN as "toxic" and said he experienced unrelenting stress and unusual bouts of crying.

"Saying that Flacks is just a tough-love coach, that's complete bulls---. I've played for tough-love coaches; most of them are ..." said the player, who has played at national and international levels of competition. "I'm telling you, it was not tough love. That is just a complete mischaracterization of his coaching style. Tough love does not include mental games or any sort like that. ... [It] doesn't give you a free pass to mentally [mess] with kids."

The players denied that playing time factored into the formal complaint with the school.

"The best way to describe it is he runs an authoritarian regime, where you cannot speak a word against him ... or else you become singled out," one former player said. "I know what's normal and what's not. The way he runs the program is not normal."

Multiple players said they experienced physical symptoms such as sleeplessness, anxiety attacks, vomiting around practice times and/or crying that they attributed to stress. They reported they had not experienced any of those physical symptoms before or after playing for Flacks.

The mother of the former player said she was so concerned about her son that she flew to the university to do a wellness check and make sure he would not take any "rash steps."

"At the time, I didn't know whether his experience was unique," she said. "I knew that by the end of the season, everybody was worn down, all the players were worn down physically, emotionally."

Five of the players say they reported their concerns to Patterson, the investigator, who ultimately determined there was no violation of Stanford's procedures.

THE ANSWER TO WHAT is effective coaching is a decades-old question, said Dr. Timothy Fong, director at UCLA's Sport Psychiatry Services. He notes that "the power struggle will always be there" between coaches and athletes, but both sides should honor boundaries.

"If it's firm criticism related to your athletic training, performance and effort, that is falling in the line again of appropriate coaching strategies," Fong said. "If it's belittling you as a person, not as an athlete, that's different."

A coach crosses the line if criticism ventures into an athlete's immutable traits, such as gender, race or orientation. It's not as clear cut when criticism is received as an attack.

Fong said physical symptoms described by the players are "very much red flags in terms of a team culture that's not operating smoothly and in the best way possible" but cautioned that not all such behavior signifies exposure to abuse.

Fong and Baghurst said players have more options now because of the transfer portal but said better communication between coaches and players is a fundamental step.

"Many coaches lack training on how to ensure that a coaching philosophy, a coaching style, is understood and agreed upon by the athletes," Baghurst said. "And if that doesn't happen, then miscommunication can occur."

It's up to Stanford to decide what kind of culture is acceptable or not, Fong said.

"Every coach in college athletics is ultimately an employee of any university that you work with," he said. "They're bound to the professional standards of being an employee of the university."

Riley Pittman said he has "never met a coach who was more clear [than Flacks] about his expectations and communicates more clearly what he needs and wants from his players."

Multiple players said they learned that the investigation was complete when Flacks held a brief team meeting in February to inform them he was cleared. The players said Flacks did not speak about a reset or offer adjustments to his coaching style. Instead, he ignored some of them during practice, told some to transfer to another school, or said they'd see reduced playing time. Ultimately, two players did quit the team, later saying their departures were not voluntary.

One player who supports Flacks, but who acknowledged an initially antagonistic relationship with the coach, described the team's spirit as currently "fragile."

The Stanford team started to fracture publicly after the San Francisco Chronicle first reported the investigation against Flacks on March 31. The article cited parents who were frustrated with the process and its results. The Orange County Register followed suit. Orange County is known as a water polo hotbed.

Four days after the articles were published, Brian Avery, a Stanford alumnus and influential donor, whose family the Avery Aquatic Center is named after, sent an email in support of Flacks to a Stanford water polo alumni group.

"FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE HISTORY OF OUR WATER POLO FAMILY, newspaper articles are appearing throughout the state of CA," Avery wrote.

Because of "the magnitude of improvements to Stanford Water Polo," he added, "I wrote a $100,000 check to Lifetime Cardinal," Stanford's NIL collective.

Within two weeks of Avery's email, 14 players and 32 parents co-signed two letters in support of Flacks, and The Stanford Daily published a supportive letter to the editor from a pair of Stanford alumni and Olympians, Ben Hallock and Dylan Woodhead, neither of whom played for Flacks at Stanford but trained with him elsewhere. They also compared Flacks to Nick Saban.

"Elite coaches achieve this [level of performance] by ensuring that nothing you face in a game is more intense than what you encounter in practice," the men wrote. "If you can't hold up in practice, you can't expect to do it when it counts."

Hallock and Woodhead went on to praise Flacks, writing, "He built up our mental toughness."

Follow-up stories appeared in all three newspapers about the retaliation investigation. The Stanford Daily published another letter to the editor from Hannah Parrish, a parent who supports Flacks. She called out the "three families" as troublemakers.

The fracture deepened over the player letter, which was provided to ESPN by a Flacks-hired media representative, David Shane. It stated, "the players who have signed below support our coaching staff, and denounce any slanderous accusations and defamation against our team, our culture, and our coaching staff."

Multiple players told ESPN they felt pressured by teammates to sign the letter. They said teammates told them coaches knew who signed and who didn't. They also said teammates hovered over fellow players during the signing process, which one described as vocally coercive and full of expletives. Instead of uniting the team, the player said, the letter served as a wedge.

A senior player, CJ Indart, said he did not witness anyone pressuring others to sign the letter and said he told teammates to sign only if they wanted to.

"I just wanted to make sure that we as a team are on the same page and I just made sure that everyone was able to express how they felt," said Indart, who signed the letter in support of Flacks.

STANFORD HIRED FLACKS in 2022 after longtime head coach John Vargas retired. Flacks had previously spent more than a decade at the elite Los Angeles private school Harvard Westlake, where he coached the boys' and girls' water polo teams and won multiple titles during his tenure.

Coming straight from a high school team to a college head coach role is not unusual in the sport. Nevertheless, some observers of the team said they were surprised when Flacks edged out other candidates with more experience.

Flacks' grandfather Craig Barrett, a former CEO of Intel, has donated over $1 million to the university, the Orange County Register reported without specifying a time frame for the donations. A spokesperson for Stanford says Flacks was hired based on his merits.

Under Flacks, the team has 60 wins in three seasons and reached the NCAA semis last year, Stanford's best showing since reaching the semis in 2020. The team won the national championship in 2019.

Among the big-four schools, anything short of reaching the championship match is viewed as a disappointment, players, alumni and parents said. By that measure, Flacks' coaching tactics have yet to yield success.

The ongoing drama continues to cast a shadow over the team's efforts to focus on water polo and recapture Stanford's former glory.

"My biggest wish," Alex Gheorghe, a player who supports the coach, said, "is just to be able to worry about water polo and being a student."