Longtime Stanford Women’s Associate Head Coach Tracy Slusser Steps Down

Stanford women’s associate head coach Tracy Slusser is stepping down after 11 seasons with the program, the school announced Tuesday.

Slusser first joined the Cardinal in 2012, serving two seasons as an assistant coach before being promoted to associate head coach in 2014.

Slusser’s tenure on The Farm included leading the women to three consecutive NCAA titles from 2017 to 2019, along with seven Pac-12 championship titles, including five of the last six.

“It has been an absolute honor to lead this program for the past 11 seasons alongside Greg Meehan,” said Slusser. “I am humbled and proud of what we have accomplished together with so many amazing young women over the years. The friendships and memories will last far beyond my time on the pool deck.

“The Stanford Athletics community has been unwavering in showing their support for the program, as well as for me and my family over the years. We will continue to cheer on the Card from the stands.”

Greg Meehan, who has been the head women’s coach during the entirety of Slusser’s time at Stanford, lauded her for her contributions to the program.

“Tracy has been an amazing coach, mentor, colleague and friend for the last 11 years,” said Meehan. “Tracy poured her heart and soul into the Stanford Women’s Swimming and Diving program and embodied the tenets of Stanford Athletics: lead with courage; embrace scholar athleticism; work cohesively; and pursue and revere excellence.

“Tracy’s passion to make a difference in the lives of these young women is unmatched and they are all the better for it. While we will certainly miss her, we are excited for Tracy, Adam, Ivy and Jade as she moves into this next phase of her life. Thank you, Tracy!”

Although it’s not mentioned specifically, both Slusser and Meehan seem to indicate that she will not be pursuing a coaching role elsewhere. By stepping down, she creates a major associate coaching vacancy for next season on Stanford’s staff.

During Slusser’s time with the Cardinal, she helped transform the team into a modern dynasty, with the team’s historic three-peat beginning in 2017 the highlight. Stanford had eight top-three NCAA finishes overall during her 11 seasons.

Slusser played a primary role in Stanford’s recruiting and development, putting together numerous top-ranked recruiting classes and securing commitments from some of the best swimmers in the nation.

She also helped coach Stanford swimmers Maya DiradoSimone Manuel and Lia Neal to a combined nine Olympic medals at the 2016 Games in Rio.

Slusser also served as the head coach of the U.S. women’s team at the 2019 World University Games, and was an assistant in 2017.

Prior to Stanford, Slusser spent time with two other top-tier swimming programs, spending one year as an assistant coach at Arizona and five at Texas A&M.

Prior to coaching, Slusser had an accomplished collegiate career at Purdue, earning CSCAA and Big Ten All-Academic honors and earning a bachelor’s degree in health promotion. In the pool, Slusser qualified for NCAAs three times, earning Honorable Mention All-America honors in the 200 and 400 free relays while becoming the first Boilermaker to break 23 seconds in the women’s 50 freestyle.

A native of Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin, Slusser and her husband, Adam, have two children, Ivy and Jade.

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Lap Counter
10 months ago

Is the family staying in the area? I think her husband is an engineer so maybe a job transfer? The best to Tracy on the next chapter/adventure!

Circle swim
10 months ago

A difficult void to fill. Would not be surprised to see one of the female Stanford swimming alumni come back to help coach the program… Dirado?

Lap Counter
Reply to  Circle swim
10 months ago

What makes alums the best choice to fill these positions? How many Stanford or Ivy League alums have great coaching careers? I think they have found their niche and make more money and don’t have to get up at 5:30 am!
Hiring alums normally doesn’t work….hire the most qualified. In this case, the person will have to live in the most expensive zip code in the country!

CraigH
Reply to  Lap Counter
10 months ago

The cool thing is that this position would probably be eligible for Stanford Athletic’s very generous housing program. They built a whole neighborhood of houses for high-level Assistant and Head Coaches to live in near the campus a few years ago.

IMO
Reply to  CraigH
10 months ago

There is a years long wait list for that housing.

Shaddy419
10 months ago

I botched my response to Lil Mosey please delete this comment if possible admins

Last edited 10 months ago by Shaddy419
Lil Mosey
10 months ago

Looks like it’s time for True Sweetser to reenter the swimming world as the new Stanford assistant. Kim Williams will have so much competition!

Shaddy419
Reply to  Lil Mosey
10 months ago

comment image

Weinstein-Smith-Ledecky-Sims
10 months ago

The wrong coach stepped down.

Steve Nolan
Reply to  Weinstein-Smith-Ledecky-Sims
10 months ago

Love to bring this energy to the conversation

comment image

Andrew
Reply to  Weinstein-Smith-Ledecky-Sims
10 months ago

rare relay guy name W

swimdad
Reply to  Weinstein-Smith-Ledecky-Sims
10 months ago

The atmosphere on the Stanford Women’s swim team is incredible. Stanford is such a special place that combines elite athletics with elite education. There is no place that rivals them. Yes they finished 3rd place the last two years, but think about that for a second—not too shabby. Greg leads a program that truly allows young people to be students first and prepare for life after swimming. Combined with the best weather and best facilities in the country, Greg will be able to find a great coach to follow in the enormous void that Tracy opens with her turning the page in her life. Best wishes Coach Tracy—you will be missed!

ACC fan
10 months ago

Oh no! Another woman gone from coaching!

TCC
Reply to  ACC fan
10 months ago

Yup. How are we supposed to get women coaching at the highest level, if highly thought of asst coaches get out of the business? Assuming that’s what she’s doing. Serious question.

IMO
Reply to  TCC
10 months ago

No idea in Tracy’s case, but in the past there have been other highly qualified female assistants that applied for head coaching jobs who were passed over in favor of a male and then quit the profession because why carry on if you’re stuck as an assistant forever?

condenasty
Reply to  IMO
10 months ago

I think we have to be careful to not take an obvious problem (women in coaching) and extrapolate it to apply to every case.

Tracy and her husband weren’t leaving the Bay Area. If she wanted a D1 head coaching job, she would have had one. The only gig she would’ve taken probably would have been Cal, and it looks like Cal is satisfied with a combined program for now. Teri wasn’t going to let anyone who wasn’t her hand-picked assistant take over that spot anyway, even if she hadn’t burned the whole thing down.

Collegiate coaching is a crappy lifestyle, and it’s not for everyone. Bad hours, long hours, tons of moving.

TCC
Reply to  condenasty
10 months ago

Agreed, if she wanted a head job she have one, but it’s a shame to lose highly regarded coaches (asst or otherwise), especially female ones. Go on any pool deck and they are glaringly few, at all levels.

FormerMG
Reply to  ACC fan
10 months ago

Correct. It’s a serious problem — just look at the recent research study SwimSwam shared. Representation matters, whether you agree or not, having women on deck matters for all the girls & women pursuing sport.

Mathrunswim
Reply to  FormerMG
10 months ago

As nice as it would be to have more women on deck, I just don’t see where the needed money is going to come from to make significant headway on it. At the club level, this is already an expensive sport even with coaches for the most part not making all that much. And in college, the focus and money seems to only be shifting more towards revenue sports.
There’s no reason to expect lots of women to sign up for jobs that don’t pay well and require you to work virtually all of the hours that your own children are out of school and awake.

Azswummer
Reply to  Mathrunswim
10 months ago

Agree. While you’re trying to be the best coach and human you can be to other people’s children, it’s hard to be there for your own kids and not sell them short.

ScovaNotiaSwimmer
Reply to  Mathrunswim
10 months ago

Huh? Can’t the female coaches’ partners take on the more of the childcare responsibilities, like male coaches’ partners currently do?

swimapologist
Reply to  ScovaNotiaSwimmer
10 months ago

Sure they can, and I’m sure some do. But as much as society is changing, that pivot still hasn’t fully happened and isn’t the norm. Regardless, that’s less of a problem for ‘swimming’ to solve and more of a problem for ‘society’ or ‘couples’ to solve, isn’t it?

Azswummer
Reply to  ScovaNotiaSwimmer
10 months ago

Yes, but if one partner is going to continue to coach, the other’s income has to be pretty sizeable. That’s the issue. It’s the time and the money.

WestCoastRefugee
Reply to  FormerMG
10 months ago

Unless of course that woman is Teri.

CraigH
Reply to  ACC fan
10 months ago

It stinks because she had publicly spoken about how much support she got from the Stanford Administration during/post-maternity. If she wasn’t able to stay on as a female coach, how much harder must it be for all of the club/high school/small program coaches who get next to no Maternity Leave or other support?

SKOOOOOO
Reply to  ACC fan
10 months ago

What if this is what she really wants? Why is that a bad thing? Coaching hours suck for anyone (men or women) with young kids.

oxyswim
Reply to  SKOOOOOO
10 months ago

For her personally it’s not necessarily a bad thing. When looked at in the context of college swimming it’s rough that one of the most successful female coaches has left the profession. There’s a ton of male coaches that have kids and they stay in the sport. She may very well have left for another reason, but the inability to keep women in the profession is a systemic problem.

WestCoastRefugee
Reply to  oxyswim
10 months ago

People just can’t accept the fact that over time, coaching starts to really suck. I think Females as a whole grasp this sooner, or maybe just have a better ability to “let go” than Males do (or possibly have more options to do so). When you step back and objectively look at the poor work-life balance, long hours, recruiting shenanigans, etc it really has to be a passion to stay in the sport, and even then it might not be enough. I have lost count of how many FT swim coaches that I know who wish they could do something else. Personally for me (being Male) I stopped coaching shortly after my first child was born. I am not going… Read more »

ScovaNotiaSwimmer
Reply to  WestCoastRefugee
10 months ago

I think it has more to do with the fact that many female coaches have less parenting support to fall back on than male coaches do.

WestCoastRefugee
Reply to  ScovaNotiaSwimmer
10 months ago

Typical comment. If her husband is an engineer in this part of the country, it’s likely that he is not just clocking a typical 40 hour work week. Maybe he’s not available to help out more. Not everything can be explained by the male/husband bashing agenda of the day. Or heavens forbid, maybe she wanted to be home with her kids (**gasp**). My wife told me straight up before we were married, if we are having kids, then she was staying at home with them.

Snarky
10 months ago

Interesting. Saw her last week at the TYR meet and everything seemed the same.

theloniuspunk
10 months ago

Did I actually comment here before the relay-names guy did?

dscott
Reply to  theloniuspunk
10 months ago

useless

About James Sutherland

James Sutherland

James swam five years at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario, specializing in the 200 free, back and IM. He finished up his collegiate swimming career in 2018, graduating with a bachelor's degree in economics. In 2019 he completed his graduate degree in sports journalism. Prior to going to Laurentian, James swam …

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