Greg Meehan Named 2017 CSCAA Division I Women’s Coach of the Year

2017 WOMEN’S NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS

When Greg Meehan took over the Stanford women’s swim program in the 2012-2013 NCAA season, he took over one of the most successful program in NCAA history. It was a program, however, that hadn’t won a title since 1998 (though, in 2010 they came up just 2.5 points short).

5 years later, maybe a year later than expected after an early relay DQ upended the Cardinal’s 2016 title hopes, Meehan brought home his first NCAA women’s team title to the farm as Stanford rolled through the competition in Indy, and for that he was recognized as the Collegiate Swim Coaches’ Association of America (CSCAA) Division I Women’s Coach of the Year.

The Stanford women scored 526.5 points, which is the most since Georgia’s 528 in 2014. Still, their 499.5 swimming points undershot their psych sheet scoring by about 50 points, showing that not everything went Stanford’s way.

Their margin of victory, though, was even bigger than expected at 160.5 points ahead of Cal (who themselves were hurt by a DQ’ed relay that would’ve mattered only in terms of magnitude of the final outcome).

In an era of increasing parity (the 3rd-place Texas A&M total of 292.5 was the 3rd-lowest in NCAA history), the Stanford women were dominant, and are lined up to continue to be so for years into the future.

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Card Nation
7 years ago

Some of these comments… I guess you can’t make everyone happy. For the past few years he’s been a great coach. Now that they have a loaded roster he’s only a great recruiter.
Meehan’s the same guy that coached 2 different individuals to Olympic Gold this summer. Also, aren’t all the “stars” still going best times? Not easy.
Now he’s won a National Championship. Kudos to him.

NC STATE
7 years ago

Kudos to Meehan. Another good candidate would be NC STATE coach. Finishing 7th. Highest in school history with swimmers that don’t come in like Stanford Stars. They really coach them, not just recruit the best.

Swimmer
7 years ago

It’s more about recruiting than it is coaching. The award should be Recruiter of the Year Congrats to Stanford. Total domination!!

Bevo
Reply to  Swimmer
7 years ago

When you recruit them, you have to coach them. Well done.

JohnJ
Reply to  Bevo
7 years ago

Not really. Ledecky, Simone, Neal, Eastin, and others were starts before Greg got them. Those women would do well (and maybe even better) under other programs.

CraigH
Reply to  Swimmer
7 years ago

I mentioned it on another article, but almost 100% of the Stanford team had Best Times this year. That just doesn’t happen on women’s teams of this caliber. Now, you could argue that some of them peaked at the wrong meet, but still he is doing something extremely in taking great swimmers and making them exceptional.

Frequentflyer
7 years ago

Congrats. It’s amazing that FL women is who won in 2010 by such a narrow margin over Stanford and now compare the two schools results this year. Polar opposite.

Swimmer
Reply to  Frequentflyer
7 years ago

You would think some of the Florida men’s coaching tips, techniques and success would spill over to the women’s team. Florida women scored zero points. One swimmer with one swim cracked the top 20 and they only had one relay entered- 800 free- finishing 21st.

Mikeh
Reply to  Swimmer
7 years ago

That’s crazy I wonder what’s up over there?

Bevo
Reply to  Frequentflyer
7 years ago

There are close to 1,500 points scored by schools who have separate women’s and men’s coaches, including 4 of the top 5.
You’d have to add up quite a few other institutions to get close that total number of points.

Pat
7 years ago

Crazy how wherever Ledecky goes, coach of the year honors seem to follow. Kingmaker or piedpiper I guess. Wasn’t Gemmell ASCA coach of year three years in a row or something like that?

Mikeh
Reply to  Pat
7 years ago

Ledecky has made three sets of coaches look amazing – Suguiyama, Gemmel, and now Meehan. All great coaches but Ledecky is just the best on earth.

John
Reply to  Mikeh
7 years ago

It was Meehan that convinced her to go there, so technically he deserves Coach of the Year.

Kathy Walker
7 years ago

Congratulations to Greg and Tracy and the Stanford team. So well done!

About Braden Keith

Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and a co-founder/co-owner of SwimSwam.com. He first got his feet wet by building The Swimmers' Circle beginning in January 2010, and now comes to SwimSwam to use that experience and help build a new leader in the sport of swimming. Aside from his life on the InterWet, …

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