Dani Korman has been named a new assistant swimming & diving coach at Yale. She fills the spot that was previously occupied by Connor Beaulieu, who left his position to join the staff at Georgetown.
Korman’s last coaching job was three season for the top-10 women’s program at Cal. She resigned from that position before reports broke alleging years of abuse by Cal head coach Teri McKeever that subsequently led to McKeever being placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of an investigation.
Korman spent her last two seasons at Cal as an associate head coach.
This continues a trend for Korman of taking jobs at institutions with elite academic reputations. Prior to Cal, she spent four seasons as the head men’s and women’s coach at MIT. Before that she had a previous stint at Yale from 2012-2015, four seasons at D3 Johns Hopkins, and two seasons at Carthage College, all as an assistant coach.
When she joined the staff at Yale in 2012, she was part of a new-look staff under first-year head coach Jim Henry, who is still the head coach of the Bulldogs.
The year before Henry took over at Yale, with Korman on staff, the Bulldog women placed 5th at the Ivy League Championships – which tied their lowest finish since 1990 (when the Ivy League Championships had 21 teams compete).
The program is in a very different place now The Bulldog women won the 2017 Ivy League title and have been in the top two at five of the last six championship meets. In 2022, they finished behind Harvard and team member Iszac Henig qualified for the NCAA Championships, earning All-America honors by placing 5th in the 100 free and 16th in the 50 free.
In 2017, after Korman had left for MIT, Henry took over the men’s program at Yale as well. They saw an uptick as well, placing 3rd at the 2018, 2019, and 2020 Ivy League Championships before sliding to 6th in 2022 – their lowest finish since 1996.
Korman is a 2006 graduate of Kenyon College where she graduated with honors as an economics major and was part of two Division III national championship teams. She was a seven-time All-American at Kenyon, set the conference record in the 200-yard butterfly and served as team captain as a senior. Korman earned a master of education degree with a concentration in guidance and counseling from Carthage College in 2008.
How did the Ivy League have 21 teams compete in 1990?
Is this the first article that says she resigned from cal? Glad she’s staying in coaching!
She knew all about McKeever and kept quiet. Shame.
>kept quiet
Do you know or are you just assuming?
How do you know she wasn’t a victim herself?
Someone that holds as much power as Teri does in the swimming community can ruin your career and make your life miserable beyond your time as an assistant. Even beyond that, look at the power she holds at Cal. How would you even go about reporting misbehavior?!
Just an awful situation.
Those are all good points. Some time along the way you still have to be accountable. Recruiting swimmers and knowingly putting them in that type of environment is damn near criminal. “It was my job” doesn’t hold up.
i do not think you really have any understanding about life and how it works … or about anything happening in her previous work.
That was deep. I do understand that if you knowingly recruit kids into this environment you need to take a good long look in the mirror.
Hi—do you understand power structures? Like… at all?
@Bud Man
Clearly you are not aware that Dani is no longer at Cal because she stood up for the swimmers and supported them.
The most recent OC register article mentioned 4 former athletic department employees spoke to them about McKeever’s abuse. It’s very likely that some or all of those 4 were assistant coaches.
Congrats, Dani! What a wonderful woman and highly compassionate coach who cares for her students and adjusts her style to make sure she can help everyone improve in all facets of life.
Yale is fortunate to have her back on staff and the Ivy League is lucky to have her passion for coaching, knowledge of the sport and commitment to building positive team cultures back on the East coast. Good luck, Dani, and enjoy being back in a setting where your skill set is valued and respected!
https://www.ocregister.com/2022/06/10/mckeevers-bullying-led-to-lifelong-issues-more-former-uc-berkeley-swimmers-allege/
I wonder what she would have to say about this
Seems to move many times.
She went from assistant at Carthage to assistant at Johns Hopkins to assistant at Yale to head coach at MIT to assistant at Cal. Every singe one of those moves can be considered a step up in her career path. I know she has been quiet about her Cal experience, but certainly lot of us are speculating that her experience working with Teri McKeever might have had more than a bit to do with her leaving the job. Being back as an assistant at Yale is indeed a step back, but it probably positions her nicely for a DI head coaching job in the next few years.
The job at Carthage College looks to have been a two year internship where she got her Masters degree in Education. So that would explain the short duration there. All movement seemed to be upwards until now. But Yale is familiar territory and so is Jim Henry I suspect being back on familiar territory at Yale may be what she needed after working with Teri at Cal. It won’t hurt her at all.