Irvine, CA – September 1 – USA Water Polo has introduced the Crew USA Males’s Teaching Employees for competitors on the 2027 World College Video games from August 1-12 in Chungcheong, South Korea. The employees options a few of the high coaches within the Nationwide Crew and collegiate programs. Longtime USA Water Polo pipeline, membership and collegiate coach Felix Mercado has been named the head coach. He’ll be joined by assistant coaches Alex Rodriguez and Derek Clappis with Alan Huckins serving as crew supervisor. Full rosters and a contest schedule can be introduced at a later date.
Mercado is the Director of Water Polo and head coach for the boys’s program at Brown College. He has been named the CWPA Northern Division Males’s Coach of the 12 months 3 times (2006, 2007, 2014) and NWPC Males’s Coach of the 12 months as soon as in 2016. Mercado led the Brown males’s crew to its first look within the NCAA Championship since 1990 in 2014 after the crew claimed its first CWPA title since 1985. He has coached this system to 377 victories and 13 seasons of 20-or-more wins.
“I’m extremely honored and humbled to have the chance to steer Crew USA on the 2027 World College Video games. Representing the US has all the time meant an excellent deal to me, and being entrusted with the duty of main this crew is one thing I don’t take with no consideration. Among the most significant experiences of my teaching profession have come from working with our Nationwide Crew packages and representing our nation alongside unbelievable athletes and coaches,” Mercado mentioned. “I’m excited to carry this group collectively, construct one thing particular and provides these younger males an expertise they are going to keep in mind for the remainder of their lives. We are going to characterize Crew USA with satisfaction, compete for each other and do every part we will to carry house a medal.”
Rodriguez enters his twenty second 12 months as head coach of each the Pomona-Pitzer males’s and girls’s water polo packages in 2026-27. Beneath his management, the Sagehens have turn out to be a dominant pressure in Division III water polo, profitable a mixed 25 SCIAC titles and 6 USAWP Division III championships. Rodriguez took sabbaticals in 2015-16 and 2021 to function an assistant coach of the USA Males’s Olympic Water Polo Crew (Brazil and Tokyo). He has additionally been head coach of the U.S. Males’s Junior and Youth Nationwide Groups.
Clappis joined the College of the Pacific males’s and girls’s water polo packages as an assistant coach within the 2021-22 season and was promoted to affiliate head coach for the boys’s crew upfront of the 2025-26 12 months. Clappis is liable for home recruiting and participant improvement for each groups. As a part of the teaching employees, Clappis assisted the Tigers to an 18-2 total document together with an ideal 6-0 mark within the West Coast Convention in 2024. Previous to Pacific, Clappis coached Huge Valley Water Polo Academy for seven years. He additionally traveled to Canberra, Australia after faculty to educate and play water polo at Canberra Water Polo Academy and Nordek Water Polo Membership.
Mercado, Rodriguez, and Clappis had been all assistant coaches for the USA Males’s Junior Nationwide Crew who claimed silver on the 2025 World Aquatics U20 World Championships.
Huckins is getting into his ninth season because the assistant water polo coach on the Air Pressure Academy in 2026. He spent 15 seasons as the top coach of the Hartwick Faculty girls’s water polo crew, previous to this system being discontinued after the 2018 season.
About The World College Video games/Universiade
The Universiade is a global multi-sport occasion organized for college athletes by the Worldwide College Sports activities Federation (FISU). The Universiade is staged each two years in a special metropolis all over the world, representing each winter and summer time competitions and is second solely in significance to the Olympic Video games.
