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Eight time NCAA champion coach Dante Dettamanti will be appointed Varsity Men’s Water Polo Assistant Coach at San Jose State University in the coming week according to people familiar with the decision. The former Stanford head coach will begin the important process of recruiting athletes to the recently reinstated program immediately upon the official announcement of his hiring. Scheduling and budgeting for the new program will also fall under his administrative responsibilities. The announcement could come as early as Monday.
In August the university announced it would reinstate the varsity men’s water polo program 30 years after canceling it. The Spartans won an unofficial NCAA championship in 1968 and were runners up to UCLA in the 1971 championship tournament. Overall the team participated in four NCAA title tournaments in the 70s before the program was eliminated in 1981.
Dettamanti’s selection will fill a gap in leadership as the school searches for the program’s next head coach. That process, according to the university’s August 27 press release, will end “in the coming months.” In the end the school is expected to hire West Valley College’s Bruce Watson, as TWp reported back in August. With Dettamanti’s appointment the Spartans gain an experienced program manager who can take charge of the team before the head coach is selected by the end of the year.
Dettamanti most recently coached as a volunteer with his alma mater UC Davis in 2013 and led the Menlo-Atherton High School boys to a CIF-CCS Championship match in 2012.
