GAINESVILLE, Fla. – As the newest addition to the Florida swimming & diving coaching staff, Bryan Gillooly will join the program this fall, head coach Gregg Troy announced Monday. Gillooly will be in charge of the divers.
Gillooly remains in the Sunshine State with his new position with the Gators. He previously coached the divers at FAU and was the age group coach of the Fort Lauderdale Diving Team since August 2014. This past season, he won the Coastal Collegiate Sports Association’s Co-Dive Coach of the Year award while at FAU and coached three 2016 Olympic trials qualifiers who trained at Fort Lauderdale.
“We’re excited to welcome Bryan to the Florida coaching staff,” Troy said. “He’s had success at many levels of diving, and we’re eager to have him leading our diving program to new levels.”
Before joining the FAU Owls, Gillooly pursued age group coaching at YCF Diving in Orlando from 2012 to 2014, guiding five divers to spots on the U.S. Junior National Squad and two to the 2012 Olympic trials.
Gillooly helped build the swimming & diving program at FIU from scratch, coaching there from its inception in 2004 to 2009. He earned Sun Belt Conference Diving Coach of the Year honors in 2004-05 and 2005-06 and developed five Sun Belt Conference Champions. Gillooly also served at the University of Miami, his alma mater, for the same period of time as the volunteer assistant coach.
Internationally, Gillooly coached the U.S. Junior National Squad at the Pan American Junior Diving Championships in Cuba last year. He also led South Africa to qualify for the 2008 Summer Olympics after its performance at the 2008 FINA Diving World Cup in Beijing. Overall, he has been a team coach for the United States, Canada, Portugal and South Africa in major international competitions.
Gillooly graduated from Miami in 1999 with a bachelor’s of business administration in marketing, where he was a two-time NCAA national champion diver, 10-time All-American and 1996 NCAA Diver of the Year. He was inducted into the Hurricanes’ Sports Hall of Fame in 2013. As a member of the U.S. National Team from 1990 to 2000, Gillooly was a three-time national champion, 1991 Junior World Champion and a finalist in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials in 1992, 1996 and 2000.
Now in Gainesville, Gillooly is ready to continue the work that Dale Schultz and the late Donnie Craine put into Florida diving.
“An important part of this to me goes back to Donnie Craine,” Gillooly said. “He was a mentor to me not just as a diver but also as a coach. I really look forward to honoring his legacy and continuing his vision for the team, building on that and creating my own from there. Donnie’s an important person to a lot of people, myself included.
“Dale did an outstanding job in the short time he was here of putting together a great team for me to start with. I owe a lot to those guys for putting me in a great position to start. I’m really honored to be on this coaching staff with all the assistant coaches and Coach Troy.”
Gillooly will begin at Florida next month.
Swimming news courtesy of UF Swimming & Diving.
Bryan,
Go gators. Dale and Donnie, had your plan in hand. Great to have you as a Gator coach. Best of wishes to you.
Lets go Gators.
Is Tanya coming with him?