Competitor Coach of the Month is a recurring SwimSwam feature shedding light on a U.S.-based coach who has risen above the competition. As with any item of recognition, Competitor Coach of the Month is a subjective exercise meant to highlight one coach whose work holds noteworthy context – perhaps a coach who was clearly in the limelight, or one whose work fell through the cracks a bit more among other stories. If your favorite coach wasn’t selected, feel free to respectfully recognize them in our comment section.
Coach Eddie Reese‘s Texas men couldn’t have swum much better at the Minnesota Invite, and they now lead our NCAA Power Ranks.
While clearly outswimming defending national champs Cal in a head-to-head invite, Texas put up nation-leading times in 6 of 13 NCAA individual events and 3 of 5 relays. Texas’s veterans look primed for a big NCAA meet, but maybe more impressive were their newcomers. Transfers Maxime Rooney and Alvin Jiang look outstanding, as do freshmen like Caspar Corbeau.
The Texas depth will be tough to overcome in March – they currently have 24 swims ranked inside the top 5 in NCAA ranks. That’s an incredible showing from the Longhorns at this point of the season.
Texas men ranked inside the top 5 in the NCAA so far this season:
- 100 free:
- #1 Daniel Krueger (41.45)
- #2 Maxime Rooney (41.91)
- #3 Drew Kibler (42.16)
- 200 free:
- #1 Drew Kibler (1:30.83)
- #2 Maxime Rooney (1:31.96)
- 500 free:
- #1 Drew Kibler (4:11.19)
- 1650 free:
- #4 Jack Collins (14:45.83)
- 100 back:
- #3 Austin Katz (44.93)
- #4 Ryan Harty (45.10)
- #5 Alvin Jiang (45.26)
- 200 back:
- #1 Austin Katz (1:37.35)
- #4 Ryan Harty (1:40.06)
- 100 breast:
- #2 Caspar Corbeau (51.46)
- 200 breast:
- #3 Caspar Corbeau (1:52.06)
- #4 Braden Vines (1:52.28)
- 100 fly:
- #1 Maxime Rooney (44.83)
- #2 Alvin Jiang (44.93)
- 200 fly:
- #1 Sam Pomajevich (1:39.35)
- #2 Maxime Rooney (1:40.94)
- 200 IM:
- #2 Matthew Willenbring (1:41.83)
- #3 Ryan Harty (1:41.86)
- #5 Braden Vines (1:42.71)
- 400 IM:
- #2 Braden Vines (3:40.09)
- #3 Jake Foster (3:40.71)
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I past 8-9 years, I had many oportunities to observe coach Reese in meets and practices, read his interviews, hear many stories from his ex-swimmers and famlies, and even meet him. His interaction with swimmers and famlies, even during meets, is something I admire greatly. You can see him during the meet, spending half hour or even longer sitting by the warm up pool and talking to his swimmers, while Kris or now Wyatt are coaching the meet. Or you can see him in stands schmoozing parents during meets. When I meet him at a summer league meet, where he was watching his grandchildren, we talked about his recent trip to Singapore. He is as friendly and chatty as you… Read more »
Greatest coach in history of the sport. Coaches his men not only in the pool but also in life.
Great coach, but some others could at least put an “arguably” before “greatest.” George Haines comes to mind- 28 (I think) Olympians, including Spitz, Schollander, Clark and some of the legends of the sport. Don’t think Eddie’s tally of Olympians is nearly that high despite the fact that swimmers in the late Eddie era extended their careers well beyond college.
I count 34 Olympians under Eddie, not counting divers.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/texassports_com/documents/2017/9/12/2017_18_msw_factbook.pdf
I’d agree with George Haines. And you didn’t even mention some of his great female Oly Gold Medalists: Chris von Saltza, Donna DeVerona, Pokey Watson, Claudia Kolb, etc.
We don’t say that Michael Phelps is “arguably” the best swimmer of all time either. That’s because when there is a clear GOAT you call him the GOAT. No one comes close to Eddie‘s accomplishments. End of story.
George Haines was great and a pioneer, but the sport was nowhere near as competitive then as it is now.
Doc Councilman? (sp?)