LOS ANGELES – The UCLA men's water polo team has hired Bruin standout Jack Grover to the post of assistant coach, head coach Adam Wright announced today. Grover, who replaces Ryder Roberts, has served as a coach with the Bruin Stars and Stripes Water Polo Club since February of 2018 and also served as an instructor at UCLA Sports Camps in 2017, teaching fundamentals of water polo to youth from 7-17 years of age.
Grover, an attacker (Pasadena, Calif./Loyola HS) for the Bruins from 2013-17, won three NCAA titles (2014, 2015 and 2017) and received honorable mention All-America recognition in 2017. He also was named second team All-MPSF and earned MPSF All-Academic accolades for the second time in his career in 2017.
During his four years as a Bruin, he helped lead his teams to arguably the best and most dominant seasons in UCLA men's water polo history. His senior class left UCLA with the second-best record by percentage at 91.3% with an overall record of 105-10. The 105 career wins are the third-most in UCLA history -- nine behind the 2015 class (114 career wins) and seven behind the 2016 class (112 career victories). He ended his career with 51 goals in 107 games while making 38 starts.
"I have known Jack now for 10 years as I had the chance to coach him while he was playing club ball," coach Wright said. "At the time, I had no clue how our paths would continue to cross. What Jack was able to do here at UCLA as a student-athlete was truly incredible. He absolutely invested everything he could into our UCLA Men's Water Polo program and that is what put him in a position to be successful over his playing career here at UCLA."
From a young age, it was apparent that Jack was a student of the game, and that in turn put our program in a position to be successful. Jack not only set the standard within our program of being a student of the game but he also set the standard of how we approach our everyday training. He constantly moved the needle forward with our culture and standards. We are very lucky to be adding somebody as dedicated as him to our program. He will be a great teacher and mentor to our current student-athletes as well as our future Bruins."
The defending NCAA Champions will compete in three different regular-season invitationals during the year, including at UCLA, at Princeton and at Stanford.
It all starts on Saturday, Sept. 1 at Spieker Aquatics Center as the Bruins face Fresno Pacific at 8:00 a.m. PT in the first game of the UCLA Invitational. UCLA will also face Whittier (10:30 a.m.) and Pomona-Pitzer (2:15 p.m.) before hosting USC in an exhibition game at 4:45 p.m.
The Bruins finished the 2017 season by winning the program's 11th NCAA Championship and the school's 114th overall with a 7-5 victory at USC. UCLA finished the year with a 21-4 overall record. It was UCLA's third NCAA title in the last four years.
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