Estancia hires Matt Frazier, Amber Peters to lead aquatics program

Estancia High has hired the new faces of its aquatics programs.

Matt Frazier will be the Estancia boys’ and girls’ water polo head coach, while Amber Peters takes over as the Eagles’ head swim coach, Estancia athletic director Nate Goellrich said in an email Monday. Frazier will also help out with the boys’ swim team.

Frazier and Peters take over for Mitch White, who resigned after three seasons as Estancia water polo and swim coach in March before finishing out the swim season.

Frazier, 50, previously spent 19 seasons as a water polo coach at Simi Valley Royal. He was a boys’ water polo assistant coach for the first 17 years and the head coach for two, leading Royal to the 2016 CIF Southern Section Divsion 4 title and earning CIF coach of the year honors. He also coached the Royal girls’ water polo team for five years.

“We are very excited that we can bring in someone with the experience Matt has,” Goellrich said in the email. “We feel he will bring our water polo programs to the next level and will be helping oversee our programs as we build a new pool facility. Matt has a ton of experience and knowledge both at the high school level, but also at the club level.”

Frazier was an assistant boys’ water polo coach at Sherman Oaks Notre Dame last season. He said coming to Estancia happens at the right place and right time. In the process of a divorce, he said he recently moved from Simi Valley to Tustin.

Frazier said he will meet the Estancia boys’ and girls’ players next week. Both teams finished in third place in the Orange Coast League last season, though the girls were in a three-way tie for third and lost a tiebreaker game to Godinez, failing to advance to the postseason.

“The only thing I really know is that I think I have four or five boys who play for [Costa Mesa Aquatics Club],” Frazier said. “I haven’t really had a chance to see them play or anything yet … You need to be playing [club water polo] somewhere. I’d love for everyone to play together, but that doesn’t always happen.”

Peters, 27, is more familiar with the Eagles. She graduated from Estancia in 2009 and is entering her ninth year as a swim coach there. She also was the Eagles’ girls’ water polo head coach from 2013-15.

Peters is a walk-on coach at Estancia, though she does teach within the Newport Mesa Unified School District, as a physical education teacher and ASB advisor at Early College High.

“I’m really looking forward to building the aquatics family back up and just bringing new life into the program,” Peters said. “We had a lot of energy, back when I coached water polo. We had a lot of energy and a lot of fun, and I’m looking forward to bringing that back into the program.”

Estancia is in the process of building a new aquatics center, but following delays, Peters said that groundbreaking on the project isn’t expected until next year. The Eagles’ old L-shaped pool was refilled and is being used.

matthew.szabo@latimes.com

Twitter: @mjszabo