New Water Polo Learning Platform – Would Love Your Input!

[prep2playsports]

Hi everyone,

I’m excited to share something I’ve been working on and I’d really appreciate your thoughts.

We’re building a new platform under Prep2PlaySports, and the goal is to create the Netflix of sports education, starting with sports like water polo. The idea is simple: give young athletes (and parents and coaches) easy access to live sessions with top Division 1 and professional athletes. In each session, these athletes break down their own game film, explain their real-time decisions, and walk viewers through what they saw, why they moved when they did, and how they executed at a high level.

Think LeBron James going for a layup. Sometimes he goes right, sometimes he goes left, but there’s always a specific read he makes based on how the defense reacts. We’re helping young or developing players start to recognize those same reads, just in a water polo context.

We’re also bringing in strength and conditioning coaches from top Division 1 water polo programs. These coaches will lead sessions focused on position-specific training, how to do each exercise properly, and how to build strength that translates to the pool. We’ll have certified nutritionists covering what to eat before and after practice, how to recover, and how to build long-term habits. There will also be a big focus on injury prevention, like strengthening your shoulders when you’re shooting constantly.

Every session is live, includes a Q and A, and is recorded and saved to the platform for easy access anytime. The Q and A is one of our favorite parts. Kids will be able to ask questions directly to these athletes and coaches about reads, preparation, recruiting, and anything they’re curious about.

We’ve already gotten a bunch of athletes and coaches signed up to participate, including several college coaches who will run recruiting talks, explain different systems, and offer tips on what they’re looking for in players.

We’re launching soon and we would really love your feedback. I’ll share more in the next post about pricing and how we plan to structure things so you know exactly what to expect.
What would you want to see in a platform like this?
What would be most helpful to you or your kids?
Would you use something like this or recommend it to other parents or teams?

We’re incredibly excited to share this with the water polo world and want to build it alongside the community. Your input truly matters.

Thank you,
Mark Katsev

[prep2playsports]

Here’s the breakdown:

$19.99/month – Core Membership

• Access to 8 live sessions per month
  • 4 sessions with Division 1 or pro athletes
  • 3 sessions with Strength and Conditioning coaches
  • 1 session with a Certified Nutritionist
• Full access to live Q and A during each session
• No access to recordings

$29.99/month – Pro Tier

• Everything in Core Membership
• Personalized strength programming from our Strength and Conditioning coaches, based on your age and lifting experience
• Direct messaging with top Division 1 athletes for feedback, tips, and guidance
• No access to recordings

$39.99/month – All-Access Tier

• Everything in the Pro Tier
• Access to recordings of all sessions in our on-demand library
• Live and recorded webinars with college coaches
• Recruiting talks and guidance
• Direct messaging with college coaches
• Extra feedback and breakdowns from both players and coaches
• Deep dives into water polo systems and how to prepare for the next level

We’re building this for the water polo community and want it to reflect what athletes, parents, and coaches actually need. Your feedback is really important to us.

Does this structure feel useful to you? Would your child or team benefit from something like this? Anything missing that you’d want to see?

[prep2playsports]

[clark]

Hey, really like the visuals here.

When you’re talking about “access to recordings”, I’m wondering if there’s a way to structure this to have a free tier access to helpful video or other media?

[NYCPolo]

I like the idea of some content available on a lesser tier. Like the idea overall, generally think it’s hard to find detailed game analysis. Love water polo Wednesday for their coverage but more technical content is really appreciated.

[BWPDad]

I think it is a very interesting idea and had seen some of the info through Jake Cavano’s announcement. One area I find a struggle when talking to people is the ability to improve polo skills outside of practice times. There aren’t goals dropped in any pools around here where kids can get pool time and work on individual skills outside of practice. Even if you have your own pool, it is limited what can be done. Most other US sports have options for a couple of kids to get together and play or work on new skills in a small group (shoot baskets, field grounders, run routes etc). Will you have any ideas or videos that will address ways to improve on your own or with a few teammates beyond the strength and conditioning?

[prep2playsports]

Thanks so much for the feedback, Clark and NYCPolo. Really appreciate it.

Totally hear you both on the importance of having some content available on a free or lower tier. We’re planning exactly that.

We’ll be sharing tons of short-form, high-value content for free on our Instagram @Prep2PlaySports, including clips where we break down common mistakes, game situations, and decision-making moments that are especially relevant for younger players.

We’re also launching a weekly series called Film Fridays, starting next week. Each episode will be a 20 to 30 minute breakdown of a high school-level game on YouTube, where we go deep into the technical and tactical aspects, kind of like a film session with a coach.

Before each episode drops, we’ll be starting a thread right here on Waterpolo Exchange called “Film Friday”. In the thread, we’ll post a short write-up highlighting the theme of that week’s video along with a few common mistakes to look out for. Then we’ll drop the link every Friday once the episode is live.

In addition to that, we’ll have a free membership option where anyone who signs up can access one live session per month. The goal is to keep valuable content open to everyone while giving a chance to explore more with the paid tiers.

Thanks again. Feedback like this helps us make it better for the whole community. Let me know if there’s anything else you’d want to see included.

[prep2playsports]

Thanks so much, BWPDad. Really appreciate your comment and your point about the difficulty of improving outside of structured practice time. It’s something we’ve been thinking about a lot too.

One thing I’ve realized during my time playing at Fordham is that everyone at the college level is a strong athlete. What really separates the starters from the bench players is their decision making. It’s not just about who scores, but who makes the right pass, who drags defenders out of position, who helps the team succeed without even touching the ball. At Fordham, every Monday after games, we’d break down film with Coach Brian and Coach Ilija, and we’d see how small off-ball habits made a huge difference in our performance.

That’s exactly what we want to teach through Prep2PlaySports. We want players to understand how to impact the game even without the ball and to bring awareness to the little habits that lead to success at higher levels.

As to your point of whether we’ll have any ideas or videos to address ways to improve outside of the water, that’s exactly what we’ve built into the Prep2Play Premium Mentorship Program, which is our one-on-one training track. This program is designed to help athletes grow between games and practices, especially when pool access is limited. Each athlete is paired with a current Division 1 player who plays their same position. Twice a month, they meet on Zoom to review the athlete’s own game film, every pass, every shot, every defensive and offensive possession. The mentor breaks it all down and gives clear, personalized feedback.

The goal is simple: learn from your mistakes after every game instead of going into the next one without any feedback, which is unfortunately how water polo works for most athletes right now. With this program, players are not just training blindly. They are building real water polo IQ, adjusting habits, and seeing exactly what to focus on moving forward.

Athletes in the program also work directly with the head Strength and Conditioning Coach at Fordham, who customizes their training plan based on what the film reveals, whether it’s shot power, explosiveness, or mobility. These workouts are tailored to the athlete’s age, position, and needs, with a focus on building real performance in the pool.

To round it out, they also receive a full nutrition plan from our certified sports nutritionist, who is also a Division 1 head coach. The plans are fully customized based on age, goals, and schedule, not cookie cutter. Athletes learn how to fuel before games, recover after practice, build muscle, and stay consistent throughout the season.

And lastly, we’re working with Gergo Zalanki and Aaron Younger, two of the best players in the world, to build a skill development database. It will include how to train all major water polo skills both in the water and on land. We’ll be posting short form clips regularly on Instagram, especially for players who don’t have goals or full pool setups. The idea is to give every athlete something they can work on, even in small groups, on their own, or outside the pool.

[saltywater]

As a parent of girls, I would want to see opportunities for mentorship from female players and film review of Women’s games in addition to the menʻs.

For the live sessions, I would need to see anticipated times that they would be scheduled. With busy school and athletic schedules and time zone differences, a lot of potential members would not be able to make the lives but may not able/willing to pay for your top tier. I would want access to recordings even at that lower level membership. Perhaps you can think on some sessions being live only but have a meaningful offering that is recorded.

[prep2playsports]

You asked, I answered.

A lot of you were asking for some free content, so I just dropped a quick breakdown you can watch without any paywall. It is part of the new Film Friday series and goes deep on guarding positions 1 and 2, especially how your positioning depends on the center’s location.

Would love to hear what you think after watching. Always open to feedback. Here is the link: [Film Friday brought to you by Prep2playsports]

[sdfirefighter]

Love the initiative. My 2¢.

Two things that are in dire need of improvement in our sport.

1. Officiating is consistently subpar. Even at the showcase event of the year, JOs. I saw a game last year (not a game my kids were in, or their club) where the winning team parents were apologizing to the losing team parents because the officials had scored the game wrong and refused to correct it. They threatened the coach with a red card even with the opposing coach saying the score was wrong. Unacceptable. There is no accountability for poor performance of officials. They don’t review film. They aren’t really evaluated on any ongoing basis. They are paid “professionals,” inherent in that is that their performance should be evaluated and there should be some accountability mechanism for poor performance. Particularly as it relates to player safety.

2. Why in the world are we still using a spreadsheet for tournament brackets? ESPN had 24 million March Madness brackets last year.

[Gibson]

The referees are getting paid about $40 a game. You get two kinds of people, those who do it for the love of the game (usually because they’ve played, a lot) and those who do it for the money (maybe they’ve played some, maybe not). Those who do it for the money get more games but maybe don’t have the history of playing to know what to call. Then, strangely, they get big egos about getting assignments and strut around people with way more knowledge and experience.