Ted Minnis has coached at just about every conceivable level of amateur water polo. He’s coached youth teams, he’s coached club teams, and he’s coached high school teams—sometimes all at the same time.

But Minnis, a 19-year coaching veteran, has never coached a college team.

That will change Sep. 4 when Minnis will stand on the pool deck at MIT with the Harvard men’s water polo team in its first contest of the 2010 season.

On Friday, Harvard athletics director Bob Scalise announced Minnis as the new head coach of both the Crimson’s men’s and women’s water polo squads. He will take over for Erik Farrar, who stepped down in May after six seasons at the helm.

“I’ve coached college-level athletes and I have had a lot of kids go on to play in college, so I know how [to work with college-level athletes],” Minnis said. “I am just going to keep doing what I’ve been doing. I’m not going to come in and try and reinvent the wheel.”

What Minnis has been doing has led his teams to success.

During his 11-year tenure as head coach of the Castilleja School girls’ water polo team,

Minnis’ squad reached five Central Coast Section semifinals and made one finals appearance.

As coach at the Stanford Club, a post he held simultaneously with his position at Castilleja, Minnis took home a US Club Championship and two bronze medals at the Junior Olympics.

These accomplishments helped Minnis earn the head coaching position for the Olympic

Development Program Pacific Zone three years ago. Since he took over, his team has earned two silver medals at the 16 and Under Olympic Development Regional Championship and Zone Championship.

But none of these coaching positions could keep Minnis from moving east when he was offered the Harvard job.

“It’s a great opportunity at a great institution,” Minnis said. “I couldn’t pass up that

opportunity.”

Minnis learned of the job opening through a handful of players he had coached who had gone on to play for the Crimson. Minnis’ former players encouraged him to apply for the job.

“I was obviously flattered,” he said.

Minnis sent in his resume, and after a phone interview, Harvard flew him across the country to visit Cambridge on June 17. A former history major, Minnis was immediately struck by the historical significance and older architecture of the Boston area.

“It’s so beautiful [in Cambridge],” Minnis said. “I was just so excited. I knew at that point if I had the opportunity to coach at Harvard, [I would take it].”

When Minnis was offered the job two weeks later, he jumped on it.

Since Minnis took up the post, he has been moving quickly to familiarize himself with his two teams, contacting players and organizing in-person meetings with players who live close to him in California.

Soon Minnis will receive tape of his two teams from last season so he can begin to get a sense of how his new players perform in the pool.

“I am really excited [to receive the tapes] to get to know the team,” Minnis said. “It’s just a process of getting to know each other as athletes and as people.”

Minnis has just less than two months to prepare for the upcoming men’s season that kicks off in early September. The men’s team, which hasn’t finished above .500 since 2004, is looking to get back on track after a 7-17 season last year. The women’s team fared slightly better, finishing 12-15, but dropped its final five contests.

“We look forward to working with Ted to move our water polo programs forward in their quest to be one of the top teams in the Collegiate Water Polo Association,” said Scalise, according to gocrimson.com.

But while a handful of weeks may not seem like a long time to prepare for one’s first season as a collegiate head coach, for someone used to coaching all year round, it feels like a long time.

“I haven’t been on the pool deck for 11 days,” Minnis said. “I am actually going a little crazy.”