Nik Caryotakis

Nik began playing water polo in second grade with his older sister Sofia after they both discovered that it was way more fun than swimming laps for their swim teams. Growing up in Portola Valley, California, he developed strong foundations in the sport with Stanford Water Polo Club, which led to a successful high school career at Menlo-Atherton High School.

His club experience included first-place finishes at the Junior Olympics (2016 – MVP), Kap7 Futures Super-Final (2017), and Kap7 Water Polo Cup (2018). For Menlo-Atherton, he earned distinctions such as Individual PAL First Team and All CCS First Team honors and was recognized as the PAL Scholar-Athlete of the Year and Menlo-Atherton Athlete of the Year in 2018.

Nik continued his athletic and academic pursuits at Stanford University, under head coach John Vargas. He contributed to two MPSF team championships (2018-19) and an NCAA team championship (2019) – the first in the program’s history since 2002. His academic achievements were recognized with ACWPC All-Academic – Outstanding and MPSF All-Academic Scholar-Athlete honors. He graduated from Stanford with a BS and MS in Computer Science and a minor in Classics.

His coaching experience includes running youth clinics at his local pool, leading groups of high schoolers at Stanford Water Polo camps and helping out with his high school club team – Mid-Peninsula Water Polo Club.

Outside of the pool, Nik enjoys being outdoors (hiking, backpacking, open water swimming) and competing in long endurance events (triathlons, marathons).