Cal State Bakersfield Head Coach and Director of Swimming Eric Bugby has resigned from his position less than three months after the school announced his hiring on August 7th of this year.
Bugby replaced Chris Hansen who was placed on administrative leave in February last year after 17 years at the helm of the program. He ultimately retired.
The team only has one full-time swim coach still on staff, alumnus Ryan Brimer, who is listed as an Assistant Coach on the website. The “Lead Assistant Coach/Recruiting Coordinator” position is labeled TBD after the departure of George Eglesfield, who left the program to join the Northern Arizona University staff on August 11th.
The team was reportedly blindsided by the departure, with his resignation coming just days after their alumni meet which swam on Saturday, October 25th.
The Roadrunners are scheduled to have their first intercollegiate dual meet of the season this Saturday when they host Pacific in Bakersfield. The CSUB men finished 5th out of 5 teams at last year’s Big West Championships, while the women’s team finished 5th out of 6 teams.
Bugby previously took over at Niagara University in November of 2019 and was named a three time MAAC Coach of the Year there.
@anonymous, you’re right the grass isn’t always greener, however to say this is karma is exactly what an “anonymous” (and petty) person would say. Eric inherited a team that was tattered and torn after Chris left. The culture Chris created was sick and disgusting. Many of the “entitled” kids you reference were in Chris’s pocket and of course didn’t see the real issues or pathetic leadership he had. Thank goodness they graduated! One thing Eric did in his short time at CSUB was bring the team back together amd they are stronger than ever before. Things are not good right now, but Chris being gone is the BEST thing that happened .
Congrats on making the most insensitive comment on this article. What kind of person writes “not much of a team” to reference 48 young student athletes? I know because I know who you are, and the readers should put zero stock in your comments.
Facts are the toxic pieces of this team are no longer a part of this team due to various types of departures in the past 6 months. The current 48 student athletes were revived and reunited under Coach Bugby. They were thriving under new leadership and did not miss the toxicity that was created over the past few years. You should watch the Runner On The Air podcast with 2 of the swim captains where… Read more »
Sybau, CSUB swim and dive has one of the closest and most resilient team cultures in the country, and we ALL put our faith in Eric and the promises he made. Nobody pushed for Eric to leave. But we pushed through Chris’s retirement and we are going to push through this, no matter what Neanderthals like you say.
Perhaps where we are all should be looking is back at CSUB. They allowed the former coach to “retire” after being investigated and did not release the findings of their investigation. They allowed the former coach to keep his non-profit club that benefits CSUB and did not communicate or ask the club parents for any input into the investigation. CSUB has an internal person doing an investigation and not a third party. I would imagine as more info became available to Eric he wanted no part in any of the things he was starting to see be uncovered and didn’t want his reputation attached to it. It is easy to distract with this latest news to take the heat off… Read more »
The CSUB athletic administration is a mess, I will give you that, but 2 corrections:
WOW! Just upped and walked away? That certainly shows a lot of character and integrity, and by a lot I mean ZERO. What, he couldn’t do the job by himself and didn’t get the assistant he wanted? Didn’t the assistant who had to jump in and take over for Hansen do the job by himself for 5 months on an assistant coach’s paycheck and then voluntarily work all of July for nothing after his contract expired to help keep the team together for the swimmers? Maybe CSUB decided that if a 30-year old could do it without help so could Bugby.
Yes, its completely possible given recent events at CSUB that the athletic administration completely failed to honor commitments… Read more »
Womp
As someone who is on the team, this whole comment section is BS. Yeah, he seemed like a good guy and nice coach, but you don’t just leave like that. I know it may seem like they didn’t support him, and he was taking care of a lot, but he chose and was fine about doing it all by himself, as he said, “he’s done it before,” and after all, he knew what he was signing up for. The grad assistant couldn’t come because of some visa problems, and he wasn’t very open to trying to find someone else to come help. Say how much you want about how nice the guy was, but it’s unheartening to the 48 athletes… Read more »
Sounds like entitlement. Maybe the “team” is the reason he left..
Yes, every human is entitled to be shown human decency! Try again, bud!
I am entitled to my opinion based on what I know and have read…. Try again bud!
You mean based on one comment you read? Please explain how you come to conclusion that kids you don’t know are “entitled” and the coach left, without explanation and without the human decency to let them know, because of them?
Isn’t he going to SMU?