Ohio State’s 2 New Swim Coaching Positions Each Pay $35k Per Year

Ohio State’s two new assistant swimming coaches Graham Carpenter and Norm Wright will each earn $35,568 in their first year with the Buckeyes. That number represents the minimum salary allowed in Ohio to exempt employees from overtime earnings.

The two are part of the Buckeyes’ new fully-staffed coaching roster that includes 6 assistant swim coaches and head diving coach Justin Sochor working under the program’s director Bill Dorenkott.

Ohio State is one of a handful of schools that have taken advantage of new NCAA rules allowing them to expand their full-time coaching staffs. While NCAA rules don’t require that those positions be paid (some local laws might), it does give the newly-created positions the full rights and obligations of full-time NCAA coaches, eliminating the former volunteer assistant positions.

While conference movement means that there is a lot of new money pouring into college athletics, especially in the Big Ten, schools are spending that money carefully when it comes to swimming. Many of these new positions have been set at the same $35,568 salary – like new NC State hire Michael Baric.

Among Ohio State’s swimming & diving coaches, only Sochor and Dorenkott are under contract – the rest work as standard employees with base salaries.

Base Salaries of Contract Coaches

• Bill Dorenkott – Director of Swimming & Diving – $250,000 (through 2027)
• Justin Sochor – Head diving coach – $105,000 (through 2027)
• Total: $355,000

Base Salaries of Non-Contract Coaches

• Ignacio Gayo – associate head coach – $95,000
• Michael Hulme – associate head coach – $95,000
• Brian Schrader – assistant coach – $95,000
• Katie Trace – assistant coach – $55,000
• Jessica Isler – Director of Operations – $51,750
• Graham Carpenter – assistant coach – $35,568
• Norm Wright – assistant coach – $35,568
• Total: $462,886

Sergio Lopez’s groundbreaking new contract that includes guaranteed pay pools for assistant coaches through 2028 has brought increased focus on total compensation for a staff as an expression of a school’s financial commitment to that program.

Including its director of operations, Ohio State’s annual base salary budget now rises to $817,886. That doesn’t include any incentive pay or any money not paid directly by the athletic department – like sponsorship deals or booster money.

Even excluding the Director of Operations, that’s significantly higher than the similarly-placed NC State, which checks in at $669,891, and emphasizes the possibility for growing financial gaps between Big Ten and SEC schools and the rest of the country.

The Ohio State women are the four-time defending Big Ten champions and Bill Dorenkott has been named the Big Ten Women’s Swim Coach of the Year for four straight seasons. The men have finished as runners-up to Indiana in each of the last two seasons. Ohio State has undergone a lot of coach turnover in the last few seasons, but it doesn’t seem to have slower their progress at the conference or national levels.

Carpenter spent last year as a volunteer assistant before being promoted to a full-time roll. Wright is the former head coach at two of the top USA Swimming club programs in the country. That includes most recently as the head coach of NOVA in Virginia, which is the home club of rising Ohio State sophomore Sanna Peterson.