Originally published 9.6.21
Former Auburn head coach Gary Taylor announced today on Instagram that he will be headed to Charlottesville, Virginia, to become the new head coach of Cavalier Aquatics, the team which formed last year as a merger between Charlottesville YCMA Aquatics Club (CYAC) and the University of Virginia’s USA Swimming team.
Next stop Charlottesville! Humbled to be named the next head coach of @cavalier_aquatics and really excited about the future of this program. The horizon is bright and the future is now. Looking forward to the ride!
Special thanks to @brooksfamilyymca, @jessicamaslaney, @todddesorbo, and the search committee. Your confidence is appreciated along with numerous others who have supported me.
#CavalierAquatics #CAY#HomeSweetCVille
#LetsRide #FutureIsNow#BackToMyRoots
Taylor succeeds Mike Wenert, who departed Cavalier Aquatics this summer after leading CYAC for since 2017. His tenure as head coach included the 2020 merger. UVA head coach Todd DeSorbo serves as the Director of High Performance for the combined USA/YMCA team now known as Cavalier Aquatics.
Just over four months ago, Taylor and Auburn “mutually agreed to part ways,” three years after Taylor was originally hired to replace longtime Auburn coach Brett Hawke. During Taylor’s tenure, the Auburn men placed 40th at NCAAs in 2019 and didn’t score in 2021. The Auburn women were 12th in 2019, but did not score in 2021. At SECs, the men were 8th out of 10 programs in 2019, 2020, and in 2021. The women were 6th of 12 programs in 2019, 5th of 12 in 2020, and 9th of 12 in 2021. Auburn did have some great performances under Taylor’s watch, including their women throwing down the 2nd-fastest 200 free relay ever in 2020.
Taylor came to Auburn after six years at NC State, the last two of which he spent as the associate head coach. At NC State, Taylor worked primarily with the distance crew, including Anton Ipsen, the 2018 men’s NCAA champion in the mile. While on staff at NC State, he coached alongside side DeSorbo, who made the move from NC State assistant to UVA head coach in 2017. Before his time at NC State, Taylor served coached the distance crew at another ACC school, coach, Florida State.
This move marks Taylor’s return to the club coaching scene after over a decade coaching at the club level; he coached for Dynamo Swim Club in Georgia and the Twin Cities Swim team in Minnesota after graduating from the University of Minnesota in 2001. While at Dynamo, he was named the Georgia Age Group Coach of the Year in 2007, and coached multiple state record holders.
We’ve been told that for now, Taylor’s will be focusing on the club team, with the potential to work with the collegiate team and pros in the future. While not the biggest age group program in the state, Cavalier Aquatics has been making some noise lately, especially with Thomas Heilman‘s assault on the age group record book over the last few seasons.
Seems to me unless you are at this club its none of anyone”s business.
Anyhow Auburn now has the Olympic champ in W Gymnastics & no one will be worried about the swimmers.
Not sure if she will ever compete for Auburn.. just announced as part of Dancing With the Stars
Oh good , she can get top credit points for that .
She will probably only compete a year then turn pro.
The season doesn’t start until after January.
Great hire by Cavalier Aquatics. Gary is an excellent Coach and a outstanding person. CONGRATULATIONS Gary and Good Luck.
Just another coach that relied on recruiting speed because he didn’t know how to coach speed. Name one unknown that he nurtured and developed that placed top 3 at NCAA’s. Not a stone an age group coach polished, but someone HE developed
Eddy: Gary coached Matias Koski at Dynamo (age group) who then finished third in the mile at NCAA’s…do you want me to research other swimmers he developed?
I would like to know of any unknown that developed into a Top-3 finisher at NCAA. I would think it happened decades ago maybe before we had thorough and available information. But anytime recently…hard to see. I guess it depends on your specific definition of “unknown”.
And I believe before he was moved to the Alpharetta location he worked with Gunnar Bentz at Dynamo who would go on to UGA and 2 Olympics.
And as I think Caitlin Cooper who would go on and win ACCs for UVA in the 50 free and finish 5th in the 50 Free at NCAAs. Good foundation for age groupers listed here that went on to swim fly/IM/distance/sprint….
This has to be the most unintelligent comment I’ve read on this website.
A great upward move for Coach Taylor! The program will thrive under his leadership. So happy he was able to get out of the AU quagmire
^ This is a bad take. This is not an upward move.
Anything away from Auburn is positive.
Amen to that. To add to your point-SwimSwam could have written this article highlighting some of the many positives from Coach Taylor’s time at Auburn (ex. the men’s & women’s recruiting classes he & his staff put together for this year) but once again, they choose a different route.
Lol you probably should’ve looked up this guy’s commenting history before high fiving him so hard. He’s a known Troll and one of the worst commenters here. I think I know who he is and i know we’re not supposed to guess but needless to say, he’s not somebody whose team you want to be on.
Thanks for the head’s up (I guess?) I’m just tired of seeing Coach Taylor battered on here…
I don’t have a dog in Gary Taylor vs. Auburn fight. Coach Taylor has proven himself a great coach. But you can’t say that this club gig is an upward move from a power 5 head coach gig.
Auburn Athletics were (still are?) a mess from what I have read:
(https://www.al.com/alabamafootball/2021/09/which-sec-football-coach-ad-jobs-could-open-up.html)
(Allegedly) Coach Taylor was put into impossible positions and he has been unable to publicly explain/defend himself. Sometimes can’t put a price on quality of life.
This has been my favorite new narrative among swim coaches. “Oh they’re unable to defend myself because blah blah blah.” Usually left under anonymous usernames that attack with a certain passion so as to bely their interests. Coley’s crew is doing the same thing.
Yeah, maybe you can’t because of an NDA. Also, maybe sometimes you can’t, because it’s true.
Swim coaches would have us believe that no swim coach has ever done anything wrong – the concept of a swim coach who is a jerk or who abused anyone or who has a bad temper and throws/kick things at athletes (Kipp, plus several before him) doesn’t exist. It’s all made up. Right?
I remember seeing the same claims about… Read more »
In Coach Taylor’s case, there was a one sided narrative put out by SwimSwam through various articles and comment sections. In every one of those articles, there were pieces of the “story” that were not the whole truth/context/situation, and due to protecting athletes’ privacy (the same athletes bashing him publicly) the ENTIRE picture was never accurately painted. Knowing Coach Taylor, I assure you that he not only “owns” things, but goes above & beyond to LEARN and GROW from every experience (good or bad.)
ASCA? LOL
I might not agree with your comments, but I can appreciate your humor
To each is allowed an opinion.
Hope they don’t expect to have any sprinters in the team
I’d just like to point out that Caeleb Dressel, the best sprinter in the world, does major yardage. And many of the top distance age groupers in the country only have pool time 1 time per day and do roughly 5-6k per day. You can be fast at anything no matter how you train. There is no 1 way to do it. Hard Work Works.
it is not the yards or no yards, it should be that individual to get coached with system that work for this individual needs
Of the few things that Bobo used to harp on that he got wrong, it was that Gregg Troy couldn’t coach sprinters and Dressel was making a terrible mistake going to UF. A great coach is going to figure out how to coach any stripe of swimmer.
No top distance swimmers do 5k/day. Not a one…
Given the fact that he’ll be a club coach I hope he just coaches them to be good swimmers.
And good people
GOATTTTT. Where the haters sitting on their couches at now??????
He truly doesn’t deserve to work with impressionable teenagers in my opinion. Not a good decision whatsoever.
On what basis did you form this “opinion”? From troll comments on SwimSwam?
Literally swimming for him personally.
In his group or on his former team at Auburn?
I’ve heard bad things as well. Auburn had an objectively abusive coaching staff under him. (I know multiple swimmers who swam on that program). There’s a reason Gideon Lowe was the only person retained by the school… Auburn wanted nothing to do Gary Taylor and his abusive coaching methods. Hopefully he’s learned his lesson but honestly I doubt it
Let’s put a finer point on it:
The Gary Taylor era at Auburn was not a successful one. They lost a lot of swimmers, had a lot of turmoil (team captain removed as such, and then transfered – is not a great look) and had some of their least-successful teams in decades.
We can argue til the cows come home about the ‘why’ behind that, we can blame it on the internet, we can blame it on this student or that student, we can blame it on the assistants, and it seems clear that Gary is willing to do all of the above*, but ultimately, if you accept the $250k+++salary + benefits + camp money that comes with being an… Read more »
1. Do you know the full story about the former captain leaving the team? I’m assuming no. Firstly, the captain was NOT removed (their captain ship was temporarily suspended) and there were serious reasons as to why that step was taken. If said swimmer (who was very talented) was in say-good academic standing, why did they not ever transfer anywhere?
How many swimmers “who left the team” decided to opt out because 1. they had never made the conference team, and 2. were not going to make it last year? Yes, there were some who were unhappy and left (like what happens on every team) and those folks decided to air out their grievances publicly.
2. Where have… Read more »
Hmmmm it’s like the robot is unaware that it exists. Weird.
Okay good, it sounds like it’s just you then who is blaming it on everyone and everything but Gary. I’m glad to hear that, for his future.
You don’t know, what you don’t know.
It’s clear that you have NOT spoken to Gary yourself. I find it more robotic in nature to blindly repeat unsubstantiated comments/rumors…
Okay but we can both agree that you have definitely blamed all of those other people, and deflected 100% of the responsibility from Gary, right?
In hindsight, are there situations that he could have handled differently? Absolutely. I think everyone looks back at times and wish they did xyz instead. He is the first one to say/admit this if you’d actually spoken with him.
The fact remains that he didn’t break rules, violate NCAA regulations, etc.
I think that he accepted the ultimate responsibility by agreeing to part ways with Auburn.
“Abusive coaching staff under him” is a heavy and UNFOUNDED claim.
This is a FACT: Coach Taylor was not investigated by any entities who look into those serious claims (SafeSport, Title IV, etc.) and you are dangerously repeating false accusations based off of OPINIONS.
Contrary to your belief, his parting with Auburn did NOT have to do with any “coaching methods.”
Title IX*
and an actual “State Fan” wouldn’t write this…
On what exactly are you basing your “opinion” on? Fallacious comments in past articles from trolls?
Interesting you should say that. I had a teenage son and teenage daughter that swam under Coach Taylor. Both claimed he was the best coach they ever had. Was a good role model with great work ethic and integrity! I would say the Cavaliers are fortunate to have the opportunity to work with Coach Taylor!
NC State reunion in Charlottesville
But with improved results