What Sets IU Diving Apart And How That Could Be the Determining Factor at the 2025 Men’s NCAAs

Drew Johansen has been the head diving coach at Indiana University since 2013 and only the 3rd head diving coach in program history. The other two, Hobie Billingsley and Jeff Huber, are legends of diving, and Johansen is chipping away at securing his own legacy in Bloomington.

Indiana as a diving program has consistently produced NCAA champions throughout its inception and sent at least one diver to the Olympics since 1964. As recently as 2023, the IU men swept the diving events at the Big Ten Championships. It is a program steeped in tradition and excellence, from its history to the present.

Just this year, they turned an old basketball arena into a top-of-the-line dryland facility and coach Johansen has taken full advantage of this novelty in their sport. With their new facility, IU divers can get more reps in a more forgiving environment than in the water, meaning when they do practice at the pool, their dives are already ahead of where they would be developmentally.

Johansen says his team is farther along than they ever have been before at this point in the season, a bright indicator for the goals Indiana Swim & Dive have for this post-season. Both Johansen and head swim coach Ray Looze have not shied away from the fact that they are chasing an NCAA team title in March. With many things on both teams heading in the right direction, this just may be the year the trophy heads back to Bloomington.

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This Guy
25 days ago

All it will take is for Texas to lose a championship by diving for them to open up the checkbook and correct that issue 😉

IU Swammer
25 days ago

SwimSwam commenters seem to take IU Diving for granted, but IU doesn’t, and that’s why it’s so good.

Pepper
25 days ago

I will go to my grave saying swimming and diving should be two different sports. It makes 0 sense that they are the joined into one just because they are both in water. Hockey and figure skating arent combined into one sport since they are both on ice.

Admin
Reply to  Pepper
25 days ago

It actually made perfect sense as to why they were originally combined: they used the same facilities, the same coaches, and the same athletes.

I guess my big question is: who benefits from the separation of the two? I’ve never gotten a (real-world) answer to that. I think everyone assumes that if you split diving from swimming, all of those diving resources would go into swimming, and I just don’t think that’s how that would play out.

The counterexample to hockey and figure skating is track & field, where they are combined into one sport because they use the same facilities.

Anonymous
Reply to  Braden Keith
25 days ago

The only benefit of the 2 sports separating would be to swimming. It would open up roster spits for swim coaches while diving would likely get cut everywhere except for some P4’s.

IU Swammer
Reply to  Anonymous
25 days ago

I doubt it would open roster spots. 30 spots for swimming and diving would be cut to 24 spots for swimming.

Admin
Reply to  Anonymous
25 days ago

I strongly disagree that it would open up roster spots for swim coaches. I think swimming rosters would shrink in most cases to account for not having diving.

ADs aren’t going to just say “we’re splitting into two sports, and also we’re adding roster spots to our offering.” If they were going to do that, they wouldn’t need to split the sports to do so.

Anonymous
Reply to  Braden Keith
25 days ago

Okay, but it’s not as if all these conferences are saying, “You get 30 roster spots, but 6 have to be for diving.” Swim coaches are given the roster spots to do as they see fit, and dive coaches are going to pretty lucky to be given 6 spots.

But either way, my main point is that diving, unfortunately, would be very hard pressed to survive without being attached to swimming.

mds
Reply to  Anonymous
25 days ago

Hobie Billingsley is mentioned here. 50 years ago I had an extended serious conversation with him on this subject wherein he expressed this same conclusion: “…diving, unfortunately, would be very hard pressed to survive without being attached to swimming.”

I’m not necessarily sure I agree with him in light of the entertainment value of bouncing, twisting, somersaulting and RIPPING in diving; I’m just saying that was Hobie’s position at the time.

FastSwimming
Reply to  mds
22 days ago

This is still true, the only reason swimming survives is because there are so many kids that swim, and just so many people in the sport. USAswimming has what 350,000+ registered athletes and over 2,500 clubs, compared to around 250 diving clubs? Couldn’t find anything on actual numbers but there are many colleges that don’t have diving and even if they do they’ll generally have 3-6 divers per gender max compared to 20+ swimmers per gender. Swimming can survive due to volume. Swimmers care about swimming, divers care about diving, clearly from this website the majority of swimmers don’t care about diving so without swimming to attach to they wouldn’t survive. Now to be fair I do think Diving could… Read more »

Patrick
Reply to  Braden Keith
25 days ago

I guess the issue I have with swim and dive is that you are taking an inherently objective sport, timed to the 1/100th of a second to delineate placings and making a judged exhibition count for significant points towards a championship. Field events are objectively measured, highest, farthest, etc. and therefore have at least something in common with track, actual winners and placings.

I have no problem with diving itself, divers are generally fantastic acrobatic athletes. But the days of swimming/diving crossover are long gone. Hold the championships at the same facility, but separate them. Award a national diving championship.

Bing chilling
Reply to  Patrick
25 days ago

THIS, subjective judged sports should not be combined with objectively scored things like swimming. If they could eliminate human error and judge with a robot or something than maybe it would make more sense.

RealSlimThomas
Reply to  Braden Keith
25 days ago

I’m confused about ‘the same coaches’ part – was it common at one point for coaches to work with both sports? I experienced that a little through summer league and high school, but I have a tough time imagining it collegiately.

Admin
Reply to  RealSlimThomas
25 days ago

It was. Tom Robinson was Northwestern’s coach from 1909 to 1944, and they won 6 collegiate championships. He also led the team to 7 water polo championships, and was the school’s basketball coach in 1919.

Gotta remember that hyper-specialization of sport for both athletes and coaches is relatively new.

James Naismith brought basketball to Kansas in 1898…and like the good Canadian that he was, also brought lacrosse to the school.

Matthew Mann, who was probably the best American swim coach in the 1920s and 1930s, also coached several Olympic divers, like Richard Degener when he was at Michigan.

Remember that the events used to have a lot more overlap too. The “plunge for distance” incorporated elements of swimming and diving.… Read more »

RealSlimThomas
Reply to  Braden Keith
25 days ago

Thanks for all this information!

IU Swammer
Reply to  Braden Keith
25 days ago

My high school coach coached both. I imagine it’s more common at smaller high schools.

JimSwim22
Reply to  IU Swammer
25 days ago

It was still happening in the 80s. My D3 college coach retired in 87 and had coached 6 different sports over his career

Texan
Reply to  IU Swammer
24 days ago

At the high school level, I’ve rarely seen a coach who didn’t coach both if they had diving. I’ve seen some high school only programs, but it seems like a lot of the time in high school, high schools with good divers have a club program feeding them and high schools with bad divers have a swim coach getting kids to dive so they can get points at district and regionals.

mds
Reply to  Braden Keith
25 days ago

Possibly the leader in the swim/dive combo coaches was Mike Peppe, Ohio State Swim and Dive coach from 1931 to 1962; 11 NCAA titles, 10 AAU national titles.

Clip from Wikipedia: “During his tenure at Ohio State, his swimmers won 5 Olympic gold medals and 19 of his athletes qualified for the U.S. Olympic team. In both 1947 and 1956, excelling even more as a diving coach, Peppe’s divers took 1st through 4th place, dominating the competition in the NCAA diving finals.”

Part of his “coaching tree” includes Hall of Fame Swimming coaches ‘Doc’ Counsilman and Ernie Maglischo.

Admin
Reply to  mds
24 days ago

Good addition to the list!

Texan
Reply to  mds
24 days ago

I remember visiting the old pool at Ohio State 30 years ago and being surprised to see the banners hanging. I hadn’t known at that point that this was part of their past history. It was really interesting to see.

mds
Reply to  Braden Keith
24 days ago

Another fun example of HOF level ‘cross-coaching,’ including swimming, was Bob Timmons. He was the Track coach at Univ. of Kansas for 23 years, including 4 NCAA team titles and superstar Jim Ryun who held the world record in the mile for 8 years.

Before going to UKansas for the track job, Timmons coached Wichita high school teams to 18 state championships in swimming, cross country and track and field.

Timmons founded the Wichita Swim Club which still operates as a USA Swimming club. He knew little about swimming back then, but the swim club became a Midwest “AAU” power and his East High School swim teams won six state championships.

“If he would have kept with it,… Read more »

SpringboardCreative
Reply to  Braden Keith
22 days ago

I just addressed this topic from a logistical standpoint looking at the cases for and against. You can view the video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwri3TPuqXQ&t=23s

horninco
25 days ago

Would enjoy the conflicted posters that enjoy Texas losing but also refuse to accept the meaning of “Swimming AND Diving” but don’t correlate that same energy to ” Track AND Field”.

Andrew
Reply to  horninco
25 days ago

Texas wouldn’t have a team championship since 2017 if you omit diving points from pedophile Jordan Windle

Texas fans are delusional, but they’re in absolutely no position to complain about getting outscored on the boards

Horninco
Reply to  Andrew
25 days ago

The joke

You

mds
Reply to  Andrew
25 days ago

Pretty brutal, Andrew. And we know how you feel about Cal. Whom do you like, if anyone?

mds
Reply to  Andrew
24 days ago

Well, I hadn’t yet read your comments below this, where your positivity gained recognition.

Grant Drukker
25 days ago

Enjoyed the diving content. Going to be super interesting to follow this season with how close NCAAs are.

Andrew
25 days ago

They have 120+ points from Tyler, Henninger, and Weinrich

Glassberg and Sollenburger are also impressive and could each be double digit scorers

Could be a 150+ point showing on the boards. Just unfathomable and likely gets IU over the edge since their swimming is equally as good as diving for once

snailSpace
Reply to  Andrew
25 days ago

I enjoy this new, positive Andrew.

Andrew
Reply to  snailSpace
25 days ago

What’s positive about this it’s just the truth

I projected a record breaking boards performance last year and it looks like it will increase even more this NCs

Texas/Cal won’t be able to stay with IU. Texas may have a few more A finals in the pool, but it’s immediately offset by IU diving and IU’s B tier of swimmers is substantially better than Texas’s

snailSpace
Reply to  Andrew
25 days ago

*hugs Andrew*
Shhhhh. Don’t ruin it.

(I also agree with you on this.)

Grant Drukker
Reply to  Coleman Hodges
25 days ago

Seems like Henveaux has been getting better and better each year. He seems like 35-40 point territory.

Tomac wasn’t anything crazy, but he’s never swam SCY before. He was also 149 SCM in December, so I would assume he will be top 5 in the 200 back, just not sure what how he’ll swim in other events. His 100 back seemed the best from the dual meet though.

Go Bears
Reply to  Grant Drukker
25 days ago

Yeah I think Tomac is a major wild card. I’ve been default assuming he is going to score 40+ points, but I’m not so sure after looking closer at his times. He should definitely A final in the 200 back, but I’m not sure about his other events (I assume 100 back and 200 IM).

There’s a world where he “only” scores like 20 points (A final 200 back, B final 100 back, nothing in the 200 IM). He could also cannibalize Cal’s other backstrokers to an extent as well, i.e. pushing Keaton Jones from A to B final in 200 back.

And I’m not sure where he adds obvious relay value. Maybe he takes the back leg of… Read more »

Andrew
Reply to  Coleman Hodges
25 days ago

I have IU, Texas, cal in that order

The gap between Texas and IU is bigger than Cal and Texas. Corbeau really shut the door tbh. Cal and Texas might be better on the top end than IU, but IU’s B tier of swimmers are better than both and that’s usually where the meet is decided. And 130-160 points from diving is hard to overcome

Spreadsheet in the works for team scoring simulations

arrow
Reply to  Coleman Hodges
25 days ago

I think (for now) it all comes down to who hits their taper the best and that is so exciting!

mds
Reply to  Andrew
24 days ago

Fun bit of history on the importance of INDIANA DIVING.

In the early ’60s, Indiana was far and away the best swimming team in the country, but they were ineligible for NCAAs due to a Football recruiting infraction. When that penalty was lifted, they had difficulty getting back to the top for a few years … until INDIANA DIVING became overwhelming.

In that era NCAA had just started scoring consolations, with only 6 in the final and 6 in consols. There were only 1M and 3M springboard diving events (No tower; no BigTen dive relay; no 4×50 Free or 4×50 Medley)

The scoring pattern in individual events was 16, 13, 12, 11,19, 9, 7, 5, 4, 3, 2,… Read more »

Mark R. Lambert
Reply to  mds
21 days ago

I am in 100% agreement with your historical data on IU DIVING.

242.5 points would be wonderful, but,
slightly high.

IF IU gets FOUR divers through Zones,
excellent opportunity to score much
better than 2024 at Federal Way!

DIVING MATTERS

DiveDove
25 days ago

All that Breaststroke U stuff is cute, IU is actually Dive U. 150 points on the men’s side at NCAAs in just the diving events is a real possibility with Tyler/Henninger/Weinrich/Sollenberger. Not hyperbolic to say that Carson Tyler wins all 3 diving events in March.

Can you name another program (in any sport) with a more impressive coaching legacy than Billingsley/Huber/Johansen? E.Reese/Bowman, R.Reese/Troy/Nesty, and Thornton/Durden come to mind

Insane stuff from the Hoosiers, thank you for covering diving!

I_Said_It
Reply to  DiveDove
25 days ago

Jim Steen/Jess Book at Kenyon

Swammer
Reply to  I_Said_It
25 days ago

What has Jess Book done to compare in any way to legacy of those listed above?

DII Swammer
Reply to  Swammer
25 days ago

He does have 5 national titles (3 Men, 2 Women). As well as quite a few runner up finishes. If team titles are your measure of success then he has been incredibly successful.

I_Said_It
Reply to  Swammer
25 days ago

Google is free. Give it a try.

mds
Reply to  DiveDove
24 days ago

Fair to add Dave Marsh to the Cal line, regardless of common complaints here about particular recruiting ‘skills,’
though only officially an “Associate”.

He won 7 Men’s titles and 5 Women’s titles at Auburn and then since he arrived at Cal in 2/22, the Bears won Men’s titles in ’22 and ’23, making his personal total 14 titles.

Having a pretty close understanding of the returning athletes, and knowing of past 2nd semester gains by the Bears, I saw Marsh on the deck at a 1st semester meet and told him that if forced to speculate on the eventual champion this spring, I suspected their group would be my betting favorite. Of course that was before we knew… Read more »

About Coleman Hodges

Coleman Hodges

Coleman started his journey in the water at age 1, and although he actually has no memory of that, something must have stuck. A Missouri native, he joined the Columbia Swim Club at age 9, where he is still remembered for his stylish dragon swim trunks. After giving up on …

Read More »