James (Jimmy) Gavin, a current freshman at Michigan State University, has announced his intention to transfer to the University of Texas in the fall of 2021.
“I am beyond excited to announce my commitment to continue my swimming career and study at the University of Texas this upcoming fall! I want to thank God, my family, friends, and coaches for believing in my story and work ethic by supporting me throughout the years, and especially during these troubling times! I also want to give a special thanks to my swim family at Michigan State University. While we won’t be able to have the 4 years together I hoped we would have had, I want to thank y’all for every moment and experience on campus this fall. It has been a blessing to swim as a Spartan and I cannot wait to compete this spring with my fellow Spartan brothers and sisters. It has been an amazing journey filled with tears, laughter, and uncertainty, and I can’t wait to see what the future holds! GO LONGHORNS AND HOOK EM!!!”
Gavin hails from Cypress, Texas. He graduated from Cypress Ranch High School in the spring of 2020 and headed to Lansing to compete for the Spartans. In October, Michigan State announced it was eliminating men’s and women’s swimming and diving due to a budget crisis. Gavin specializes in mid-distance and distance freestyle; he is a Winter Juniors qualifier in the 200/1000 free and a Summer Juniors qualifier in the 500/1650 free.
Top SCY times:
- 1650 free – 15:33.85
- 1000 free – 9:18.02
- 500 free – 4:27.01
- 200 free – 1:38.95
In his senior year of high school, Gavin came in 15th in the 200 free and 8th in the 500 at the 2020 Texas UIL 6A State Championships. His best times in those two events came two weeks earlier at the Region 5 Championships.
Representing his club team Katy Aquatics, he notched PBs in the SCY 50/100 free, and LCM 400/800/1500 free at 2020 College Station Sectionals at the end of February. He finished 14th in the 400 free (4:07.90), 10th in the 800 (8:29.09), and 9th in the 1500 (16:12.81). He will join a training group with current Longhorns Alex Zettle, David Johnston, and Ethan Heasley, and will begin his adventure in Austin with UT class of 2025 commits #2 Anthony Grimm, #4 Tim Connery, #15 Luke Hobson, Marko Vujosevic, Kayde Cross, and Nathan Quarterman.
Fantastic! That is amazing!; so glad you came back home! Katy/Houston we Love You!
Congrats to Jimmy on finding a landing spot after being put in a tough position
Side note:
Shame on you people for down voting comments made in support of a young man just trying to continue his education and swimming career, it certainly doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things but it’s kind of sad to see that people will do that out of spite or some other screwed up motive
Imagine winning 4 of the last 5 NCAA titles and still being so fragile as a program that you can’t handle everyone on earth not being a Texas fan.
But I guess the winning 4 of the last 5 NCAA titles explains having a big enough ego that you think strangers on the internet are going to be weighed down by you placing shame on them.
It’s sports, man. Lighten up.
It has nothing to do with the school, notice I didn’t mention any need to respect the school, it’s about the kid.
No, I won’t “lighten up”. I’d rather people that down vote commitment articles raise their own level of sportsmanship, not lower myself to theirs
But to each their own I guess
The swimming community is a pretty tight-knit group, and generally there’s not a ton of shade thrown around, unless it’s deserved (poorly run programs, people being banned for life, programs being cut, etc).
Not at a kid who gets to continue his career at the best swimming program of all-time. Who cares if he won’t travel? There are loads of walk-on kids at every college who are a little out of their element.
You forgot the “yet”… Maybe he won’t travel next year, but just wait and see what happens after he trains with that crew for a couple years.
I would not read too much into downvoting comments, I bet we have some commenters who just enjoy pressing “down” button because they can 🙂
It’s just childish and unnecessary given the content of the article, but I guess that says a lot about the people that do it
I downvoted this comment…to prove you right.
Awesome news! Proud of you man
To the parents of Jimmy – I just met you guys down at the Co-op at UT! Best wishes to your son… what an exciting transition!😀
No one more deserving!! Phenomenally nice kid and great athlete.
Shame that a Power 5 football power from the richest conference is dropping swimming.
Yeah just the payout they gave their old head coach this year would probably keep swim program going for a couple of years.
EDIT: Their old football coach that is.
Yes, shame on Michigan State University. Cancelling its swim & dive program In its 99th year. Program began in 1921, three years after the last pandemic and survived WWII. The reasons for the cancel presented in the cancellation announcement were disingenuous.
They lost to a D3 team, broham.
I’ve seen the posts about pool this, pool that, but…if they didn’t fire that head coach after losing to a D3 team, then this was the only possible long-term outcome.
Awesome kid and hard worker! Congrats!
Lol, will probably set some NCAA record in the breaststroke or something in a few years… Congrats Jimmy!