Ben Prucha, a two-year club swimmer and senior at UNCW, got the opportunity of a lifetime when he was offered a spot on the UNCW varsity roster this past November.
His story seems almost too good to be true. How many club swimmers get the opportunity to join their school’s DI program for their final college semesters? Not very many, but Prucha’s story is not the norm.
Prucha is the oldest of three kids and a North Carolina native. He admits that he did not take the college recruiting process as seriously as he should have, and entered his final semester of senior year at Green Hope High School without any serious prospects.
He was swimming with the TAC Titans at the time, and he credits his club coach, Eddie Gillie, with helping guide him through the process in his final semester. He wasn’t able to find a program that matched what he was looking for because he wanted to stay in his home state. He says he did reach out to UNCW, but they turned him down.
After nothing panned out for him, he decided to stay home and go to local community college Wake Tech to “take a year, save some money and keep searching there and swim.” While at home, he continued to train with TAC and reach out to college coaches with continued guidance from his coach.
Nothing was working out swimming-wise, and he ended up breaking his collarbone in the summer after his freshman year of college. This made him “give up” on his varsity swimming dream and he decided to attend UNCW as a regular student and just join the club team.
Prucha speaks very highly of his time on the club team and on college club swimming as a whole. He made a point to emphasize how much fun he had and how enjoyable it was throughout the entire interview. He does say that he was not that dedicated during the first semester, swimming maybe twice a week in practices he described as “fun and very chill.” He even mentions that he joined the club tennis team at the same time which he was far more focused on.
At the start of the second semester, Prucha and his friend, Briggs Cloutier, decided they wanted to go to Club Swimming Nationals, leading to their decision to start training with the Masters team, which was coached by UNCW assistant coach Sarah Richards. This is where he formed the relationship that would lead to his roster spot.
Prucha had a good performance at his first Club Swimming Nationals, though nothing earth-shattering. He went a new best time in his 50 freestyle of 20.92 and he placed 10th in the event. He also swam the 100 free, going 47.72 to finish 49th in the event.
After that, Prucha fell in love with the sport again and began training seriously. At this point, he started swimming on his own during Masters practice, doing sets that Richards was writing for him. He also began helping out the team with their lessons program after the club season was over.
When he returned for his junior year in 2023-2024 on the UNCW club team, he continued swimming on his own during Masters practice with a significant amount of guidance from Richards. During this time, she told Prucha that they needed help running the Hy-Tek system for UNCW’s dual meets, which he began doing, forming relationships with other people on and around the team.
Prucha also began integrating himself within the team, due to the fact that his younger brother, John Prucha, and younger sister, Abby Prucha, were freshmen for the 2023-24 season. John also spent a year at a community college before heading to school, so he and Abby started together.
At Club Nationals last year, Prucha had a standout meet. He went new personal best times in the 50 free, 100 free, and 100 back earning top-5 finishes in the 50 and 100 free. He dropped to 20.57 in the 50 free finals for 4th and 45.51 in the 100 free to finish 3rd. He jokes that it sounds corny, but he “never thought he would swim that fast.” He gives a lot of credit for these drops to Coach Sarah and all the work she did with him during the season.
After this meet, Prucha’s brother John decided to leave the UNCW team and began training with Ben and fellow club member Briggs Cloutier, which is how the three finished out the school year.
In May, Bobby Guntoro, UNCW’s head coach invited Prucha to train with the team through the summer, emphasizing that this was not a roster spot, just an opportunity to train with the team. At the beginning of the season this past fall, Prucha was right back on the club team, even swimming a meet with them at the end of October.
At the beginning of November, Guntoro called Prucha into his office, which Prucha said “terrified him” because his immediate thought was that he had “screwed up” while running the Hy-Tek at their last meet. He wasn’t in trouble though, instead, Guntoro offered him a roster spot.
Prucha accepted, and then began the weeks of paperwork and testing associated with joining an NCAA sport, leaving him in a sort of limbo and still unable to practice with the team for a few weeks. He described this whole experience as “stressful for him, but not really for anybody else,” and the worst part of the transition so far.
Ultimately, he got one practice with the team before they traveled to the Gamecock Invite in November, where Prucha swam his debut Division I college swim meet. He swam the 50 free (20.82) and the 100 free (46.54), even earning a second swim in the 50, placing 27th.
He is now experiencing the pleasure of his first-ever winter training, and he says the best part of the experience so far has been the consistent schedule and getting to swim with a large group of people, rather than just by himself or with a small group.
He joked about how last year his brother and sister had to stay at school to train and he got to go home early to be with his parents, and this year, since his sister decided to leave the team after midsason, “they completely switched” and he had to stay at school to train and they got to go home.
When asked if he thought club swimming rosters were a good place to look for talent, Prucha had an interesting answer. He said that it would “be cool if coaches paid attention to athletes who were putting in the effort and showing up and performing”, but he also talked about the fact that a lot of people who swim club in college are doing it to have fun. They don’t all want roster spots on the NCAA team and he mentioned a few swimmers he knows who have been asked to join their school’s team, but they turned the offer down.
Guntoro recently posted a video on Twitter of Prucha swimming practice with the team saying “Ben Prucha is living his dream.”
Ben Prucha is living his dream. Couldn’t make our roster coming out of High School and decided to swim with UNCW club team.
We added him onto our Roster late this Fall. He’s lighting it up!
“Don’t give up, don’t ever give up.” pic.twitter.com/1qckrMss3g
— Bobby Guntoro (@bobbygunt) January 4, 2025
Swim fast Ben!
Wait so his brother and sister quit the team right before he joined? interesting and incredible story 🙌
Usually people go from varsity to the club team, but kudos to this guy for moving up!
I did college club swimming and I’m happy this led him to achieve his goals.