U.S. women’s water polo, with an unlikely hype man, eyes Olympic history — and change for the sport

Flavor Flav realizes it’s an unexpected crossover.

The rap icon once had only a vague awareness of water polo, as he’d seen Olympic matches on television. But Flav has a new appreciation for the sport, marveling at the immense stamina required to play it, after recently signing a five-year sponsorship deal to serve as the official hype man for the U.S. women’s and men’s national water polo teams.

“What type of relationship does rap have with water polo? None,” said Flav.

Until now.

How the collaboration came together is well-documented: Maggie Steffens, the U.S. women’s team’s longtime captain, posted a photo of the players on her Instagram in May with a caption outlining challenges the athletes often face, including that players typically work multiple jobs while pursuing their Olympic dreams. She called on her followers to watch and support women’s sports.

Flav, who said his manager initially flagged the post, responded to the call, pledging his support. Thus, an unprecedented partnership was born. He and Steffens appeared together last Monday on “CBS Mornings,” where Flav announced he would give $1,000 to each team member and a Virgin Voyage cruise to the squad.

The 65-year-old Rock and Roll Hall of Famer told The Athletic he plans to attend the Paris Games, cheering on the team as they aim for a fourth straight Olympic gold medal, a feat that has not yet been accomplished by any men’s or women’s water polo team.

“I’m there to hype them up. I’m there to try to get them into that spirit of winning that fourth gold medal,” Flav said with a confidence befitting his role. “… And I know we can do it. We’re gonna get it.”

Flav also said he plans to attend the women’s team’s final pre-Olympic home match against Hungary. He wrote in a post on X he’ll be at Tuesday’s match in Berkeley, Calif., and will take photos and sign autographs “before and after the game but not during the game” so he can stay locked in.

Imma be at the game on Tuesday,,, I will be taking photos and signing autographs before and after the game but not during the game,,, we all here to cheer on these women https://t.co/8AHYAtzE0R

— FLAVOR FLAV (@FlavorFlav) July 3, 2024

“I’m trying to get as many people as I can involved,” he said. “Hopefully what I’m doing will open up the doors for other celebrities like myself to help sponsor these Olympic teams, because these (athletes) are out there busting their butts to make the United States look good.”

The U.S. women’s water polo team has welcomed the additional eyeballs as they go for an Olympic record. Coach Adam Krikorian, who has guided the United States to more Olympic golds than any coach on any team in women’s water polo, called it “a sport that’s been starving for attention and looking for notoriety.”

“We are a team that feels like, at times, we go unnoticed,” he said. “And so, when you have someone who’s in the spotlight share their love and their passion for our team, it’s touching. We love it. We embrace it. We hope it inspires others to hop on.”

Krikorian said he doesn’t mind if Flav’s interest encourages a bandwagon group to follow their journey this summer: “We’ll take ’em all. You didn’t need to be with us in the beginning.”

What any new fans will be rallying around is a squad synonymous with success. Since he was hired in 2009, Krikorian and the U.S. women have gone on a staggering run, claiming gold at the last three Olympics and six of the last nine world championships.

But Krikorian — a former UCLA water polo standout who calls the late basketball legend John Wooden his coaching idol — is less concerned with the results. The scores don’t even come up when his staff reevaluates a practice or a game. He preaches presence over perfection, a philosophy he highlighted when discussing Emily Ausmus, an attacker who Krikorian said has taken on a larger role as a defender “headfirst.”

At 18 years old, Ausmus is the team’s youngest player and represents a corps with no Olympic experience on a roster nearly split between first-time Olympians (seven) and returners (six). That experience level is a shift from the last Olympic cycle in Tokyo in 2021 when most players were part of the group that also won gold in Rio in 2016.

On the opposite end of the experience spectrum is Steffens, who helped lead the U.S. to gold at the last three Games. At the Tokyo Olympics, she became the all-time leading scorer in women’s Olympic water polo. And if the U.S. women get gold in Paris, Steffens will become the first water polo player to win four Olympic gold medals in a row.

Steffens, 31, can rattle off a list of younger players on this year’s roster with whom she connected in earlier phases of life, highlighting the full-circle experience for her this Games:

— Ryann Neushul, 24, is the third Neushul sister Steffens will play with at the Olympics. “I remember when she was just a kid,” Steffens said;

— Jenna Flynn and Steffens posed together for a photo at the Rio Games when Flynn was a young fan. “Now she’s at Stanford and here on Team USA and one of my closest friends on the team, and we’re 11 years apart.”

— Jewel Roemer is a Northern California native like Steffens, and Steffens grew up attending men’s scrimmages at Diablo Valley College coached by Roemer’s father. “I remember getting cute videos from (Jewel) saying, ‘Good luck.’”

— Ausmus attended camps and clinics organized by Steffens’ company, 6-8 Sports. “(She was) somebody we talked about five, six, eight years ago, like, ‘Oh my gosh, this girl’s so good and we’re really excited to see her potential.’”

“We’ve really created this special bond,” Steffens said of the younger group. “And I think as much as they look up to me as a leader and have looked up to me since they were kids and followed that path, I think what’s really amazing is I look up to them just as much.”

Steffens is sincere in her praise, as she is in her belief in her teammates. Ashleigh Johnson, who is making her third Olympic appearance with Team USA, called Steffens “a dreamer in all senses.”

“When you’re around Maggie, anything is legitimately possible,” said Johnson, 29, the team’s goalkeeper who is widely considered the best in the world at her position. “She’s our captain, but as her friend, she will build a way for any dream to come true. And if you believe something, she believes it and you guys are going to accomplish it together.”

For example, Johnson said, Steffens typically encourages others while grinding through the hardest parts of training or pushing through a final swim set. Outside of the pool, Steffens is the one to land in a new city after 24 hours of traveling and either have a full itinerary ready or explore without a plan. She has an “Energizer Bunny attitude,” according to Johnson.

That boundless energy has carried over into other facets as Steffens and Johnson have become de facto ambassadors of their sport, a role that wasn’t always natural to them. In 2016, Johnson became the first Black woman to make the U.S. Olympic water polo team. She said, over time, she’s felt more empowered to speak about her experiences, share her story and champion diversity to inspire others.

Steffens, who joined the team when she was 15 years old, said it’s taken her 15 or 16 years to find her voice in terms of advocating for women’s athletes and more openly discussing the financial challenges of pursuing the sport.

Olympic water polo training takes place in Southern California, an area of the country with a notoriously high cost of living. In an Olympic year, training is six days a week and is essentially a full-time job for the athletes, Steffens said.

Payouts at the Games depend on the sport, country and finish, but the International Olympic Committee and each sport’s governing body have not traditionally paid winners. In a first for an international federation, World Athletics, which oversees track and field, announced in April it would award $50,000 in prize money to gold medalists at the Paris Games.

The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee gave athletes $37,500 for winning gold, $22,500 for silver and $15,000 for bronze at the Tokyo Olympics.

Steffens said she would play water polo — which doesn’t have a professional women’s league in the U.S. — if she made no money and had to couch surf, but her hope is for future water polo athletes to not have to work other jobs to support themselves while performing at the highest level.

“I would love to see in the future people retire much later in their career because they can afford to keep playing water polo and don’t feel like they have to retire at 22 to get a ‘real job,’” she said.

Any support helps, Steffens said, and Flav’s sponsorship is an example of the payoff she’s seen after posting about the topic.

“One thing that I love about water polo and about our team is it’s a very head-down, humble, hard-work mentality,” Steffens said. “And one of my dreams is to leave the sport and the women in this sport better than when I came in, and hopefully provide more opportunity, provide more exposure, let their stories be told, let their names be heard.”

Steffens knows there’s more work to do and more fans to rally. But each one counts, and so far, she’s hitting her goals.

(Top illustration of Maggie Steffens and Flavor Flav: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic; photos: Ronald Martinez / Getty Images, Jerod Harris / Getty Images for The Recording Academy)