Teri McKeever, California’s head women’s coach, announced that Kathie Wickstrand will be joining the staff as an assistant coach. Wickstrand is replacing the former Assistant coach of nearly ten years, Kristen Cunnane. Cunnane stepped down from her role as the Associate Head Coach because it became “too much to give the California program and girls what they deserve, along with being able to give [her] family and children what they need.”
Kathie Wiskstrand coached collegiately at Northwestern, Purdue, and Illinois State. Over the years, Wickstrand has served as a mentor and consultant to McKeever. In a BearInsider article from 2013, they talked about about how McKeever was able to gain confidence as a coach because of her relationship with Wickstrand.
“She reached out to Kathie Wickstrand, a Northwestern coach whose swimmers were having fun at NCAA meets even without much success. Wickstrand-Gahen counseled McKeever for eight years, showing her that coaching is teaching first, winning second.” – BearInsider.com
California is coming off of a spectacular season. As a team, they won their fourth NCAA team title on seven years, had multiple NCAA Champions, broke two NCAA and American records, and had a swimmer, Missy Franklin, win the Swimmer of the Year award.
“I believe that we have a tremendous core group supporting our program and I have elected to maintain as a staff those people who understand us best.”
“I have known Kathie for 25 years and, perhaps more importantly, she knows our team, as well, having served as a consultant for us focusing on team building and group dynamics for many years. Kathie, a two-time Olympic Trials qualifier and silver medalist in the 400 free at the Pan Am Games, brings experience as a college head coach at Northwestern, Purdue and Illinois State. Since 1995, she has run her own company, The International Coaching Society, consulting with hundreds of companies, teams and individuals, including numerous Olympians and national team members, on ways to improve their effectiveness and achieve their desired goals. With Kathie on board every day, I feel that we will be in wonderful hands.”
What is with all the down arrows for just saying something positive about this hire?!
I know Kathie W. and was a D1 coach with her. She is a class act and I think this will be great for Cal.
Congrats to both Kathie and Teri!
Fascinating background information about Coaches Wickstrand and McKeever from the book published about Natalie Coughlin called “Golden Girl: How Natalie Coughlin Fought Back ….” These coaches go waaaaay back. It will be quite interesting to see what happens next on the swim journey of life at Cal.
https://books.google.com/books?id=mR-e7y2YeXIC&pg=PA100&lpg=PA100&dq=Kathie+wickstrand&source=bl&ots=FKrD9OxHUU&sig=SipV7pQ_wT3iHEUMIEZvW8ZZP_U&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CDoQ6AEwB2oVChMI3dj09-yBxwIVx0yICh2VjAb_#v=onepage&q=Kathie%20wickstrand&f=false
The excerpt in the link highlights the great impact of Coach Gene Lee and the great rapport he had with his swimmers. He handled his terminal diagnosis with tremendous dignity and grace, and became even more of an inspiration to his swimmers.
Haters gonna hate. I’m thinking the coach of the current NCAA championship team has every right to decide who she thinks is the best fit for her program. Unfortunate to see so many jealous people in this sport.
Congrats Kathie, enjoy being back on deck coaching!!
Was it illegal to have her as an consultant? Wasn’t she just another coach with a glorified title? Guess the compliance people were fooled!
What did she exactly do as a “consultant”?
“With Kathie on board every day, I feel that we will be in wonderful hands.”
Kathie’s been on board for eight years already…so same ole. No more “rainbows and unicorns” with Missy gone. GOOOOOO Bears!
Great hire, coach & person. She did a great job at all her positions.
Good Luck Teri & Kathie !!
Lately for every mention of the (NCAA champs) Cal swim team there are now a suspicious number of down votes at this site. Even as low as down voting the progress of the new pool?
I suspect this self serving envious troll is related and have recently discovered he or she can move around this sites’ tracking system for down votes,
Typically, these people are quite transparent. All you need to do is pay attention.