Alumnus back poolside for Waubonsie

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While he has plenty of head-coaching experience in water polo, Waubonsie Valley alumnus Luke Payette will be a swimming head coach for the first time at the high school level when the Warriors take to the pool this winter.

Waubonsie athletic director Mike Rogowski confirmed in an e-mail to The Sun on Tuesday that Payette was hired to replace Chad Ganden as the boys swimming coach at the school. Payette signed his contract at the end of July and was given District 204 board approval Aug. 25.

Payette spent the last three seasons as both the women's water polo head coach at Carthage College in Kenosha, Wis., and the head girls water polo coach at Highland Park High School. Before that Payette was the girls water polo coach at Neuqua Valley, winning two sectional titles and placing third in the state in 2003.

"I will be looking at it as a true aquatics experience, to have fun and exceed across the board," he said. "Obviously my resume seems a little full on the water polo side, but I've been doing the swim coaching for a long time."

Payette is heavily involved in youth water polo. He is the chairman of the Illinois Water Polo Association and coach of the U.S. Midwest Zone Team, which has allowed him to work with the national team.

He began coaching swimming in 1990 as the coach of the Centennial Beach team for the Naperville Park District and did that for 10 summers. Payette was an assistant at Neuqua from 1998 to 2003 and was the aquatics coordinator and assistant swim coach at Highland Park from 2003 to '07.

Ganden, who is still listed as the boys water polo coach at Waubonsie, resigned as the boys swimming coach in May to take a teaching job at an elementary school in Joliet.