Come to any UCLA women’s water polo game, and next to coach Brandon Brooks, you’ll likely see another coach talking to the players. Shorter and with significantly longer and blonder hair than Brooks, assistant coach Molly Cahill has been an integral part of the No. 2 UCLA program for the past five years.
Her presence on the pool deck, however, is not exactly typical for an elite women’s water polo team. Cahill is one of the relatively few women coaching at the elite collegiate level. While not entirely rare, only 15 of 48 full-time coaches of top-20 women’s water polo teams are women. Only two of them, Maureen Cole at No. 13 Hawaii and Carin Crawford at No. 17 San Diego State, are head coaches.
While Cahill doesn’t think that’s because of sexism or a barrier of entry to women, she does hope that more women start to coach. The lack of women, Cahill thinks, is rather just a matter of numbers.
“I think the opportunity is equal. I don’t think that the number of female coaches out there is great enough that they can fill all the positions that open up,” Cahill said. “I think in the next five to 10 years you’re only going to see more women in the coaching scene which is, I mean, only going to be more beneficial to the sport.”
Cahill said the pipeline for water polo coaches starts while players are still in college. Many spend time coaching youth and high school teams while still playing at the collegiate level or immediately after. From there, some go on to get hired at college programs.
As these women are successful as assistants and at coaching youth and high school teams, they will begin to break into the ranks of the top coaches. And that, both Cahill and former UCLA coach and current national team coach Adam Krikorian say, is only a good thing for the sport.
“I’m looking for great women coaches because I think we need more of ’em,” Krikorian said. “I think our women athletes need more women role models and would love to be more involved in the coaching side of things.”
Sophomore attacker Rachel Fattal agrees.
“It’s always nice to have a female on staff, especially on a girls team. She played, and it’s not like she played a long time ago, she played recently and played here, so she’s very relatable,” Fattal said.
Of the women who are currently coaching women’s programs, UCLA women’s water polo alumni are very well represented. Three alumnae are head coaches and five, including Cahill, are assistant coaches.
“UCLA alum coaching a lot (is) one of the coolest things for me. In my position (as national team coach) I go around and scout players and I’m observing coaches as well,” Krikorian said. “It’s a good sign as to what we did at UCLA. It’s more than winning championships – it’s producing good people and hopefully good coaches as well.”
While Cahill says she’s happy with her current job, she hopes to some day become a head coach at a top collegiate program. If she does, she would be part of a trend that her and Krikorian both see in women’s water polo coaching – as more women play water polo at the elite level, more have gotten involved in coaching, and now more are rising to the top of the coaching world.