"What's happening with the Texas Men"

NCAA finals this weekend. Currently #2 going into last day. Top 5 is relatively packed together.
 
Texas men’s team is on a bit of a dive. Not swimming super fast. Few elite stars now and recruiting is up in the air. The GOAT Reese is retiring, but they haven’t named a replacement (probably can’t until after the season, which probably means it’s not the assistant coach). So many programs beyond Cal (Virginia, NCState, ASU) are hottttt in recruiting and passing us. We even lost to A&M for the second time in 61 years.

CDC needs to hit a home run here. Hopefully he’s targeting the biggest names out there. Maybe it will affect the Women’s team and create a combined team, who knows. Carol’s done a great job and has the women rising.

I think our only hope for only a temporary down spot is a huge, established coach who then acquires some of their good swimmers as transfers and recruit flips.

We need something big here. At this point, I don’t know if we finish top 10 at NCAAs. That’s premature, sure, but there’s reason for it to look gloomy.
 
UTexRulz23 said:
We need something big here. At this point, I don’t know if we finish top 10 at NCAAs. That’s premature, sure, but there’s reason for it to look gloomy.
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Well, we finished 7th (and we beat Stanford).
 
What an absolutely amazing career for Eddie Reese. His accomplishments will likely never be replicated. That said Bob Bowman is a grand slam hire and ensures that Texas Swimming will continue to be a national leader. Great hire by CDC.
 
What can you say about Eddie Reese? Numbers you wouldn't believe. Of course I knew about all the conference & national championships, but just learned this one today- 46 years at Texas, 44 top-10 finishes. And what a great hire to replace a true legend.
 
STHAustin said:
What can you say about Eddie Reese? Numbers you wouldn't believe. Of course I knew about all the conference & national championships, but just learned this one today- 46 years at Texas, 44 top-10 finishes. And what a great hire to replace a true legend.
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My son's Water Polo team made the State Tournament at the Jamail Swim Center in 2009. The boys were scheduled to practice right after the UT men swim team practice so we all showed up early to watch.
I expected to see an all out ball busting hard *** practice. That was the standard I saw from all the San Antonio area swim coaches.
I was dumbfounded. Coach Reese's practice was an easy-going, fun filled event. He had the guys playing games & doing fun competitions in the pool. I was accustomed to seeing the SA coaches burn thru 1,000's of swimmers looking to find the next Josh Davis. When I say "burn thru", maybe "burn out" would be a more appropriate term. Of the dozens of swimmers that I knew personally who were good enough to swim at the next level, only 1 actually did so (for UNT). It was truly sad to see so many kids burned out/turned off of the sport they loved so coaches could find another great.
Paraphrasing Eddie, it was NOT championships that drove him, rather the relationships he was privileged to form.
Coach Reese was a GREAT coach, but an even better human being. It is always wonderful to have a GOAT associated with the University and Eddie was/is most definitely a GOAT.
 
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1sahorn said:
My son's Water Polo team made the State Tournament at the Jamail Swim Center in 2009. The boys were scheduled to practice right after the UT men swim team practice so we all showed up early to watch.
I expected to see an all out ball busting hard *** practice. That was the standard I saw from all the San Antonio area swim coaches.
I was dumbfounded. Coach Reese's practice was an easy-going, fun filled event. He had the guys playing games & doing fun competitions in the pool. I was accustomed to seeing the SA coaches burn thru 1,000's of swimmers looking to find the next Josh Davis. When I say "burn thru", maybe "burn out" would be a more appropriate term. Of the dozens of swimmers that I knew personally who were good enough to swim at the next level, only 1 actually did so (for UNT). It was truly sad to see so many kids burned out/turned off of the sport they loved so coaches could find another great.
Paraphrasing Eddie, it was NOT championships that drove him, rather the relationships he was privileged to form.
Coach Reese was a GREAT coach, but an even better human being. It is always wonderful to have a GOAT associated with the University and Eddie was/is most definitely a GOAT.
Click to expand...
Growing up in San Antonio and having feedback from friends that swam both at my high school and for others in the mid-80s, your observations are spot on.
 
Vino Bevo said:
Growing up in San Antonio and having feedback from friends that swam both at my high school and for others in the mid-80s, your observations are spot on.
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Wow...mid-80's proceeds Josh Davis by almost 10 yrs.
Occasionally they (HS coaches) get a Jimmy Fagen, but very rarely a Josh Davis (no disrespect for Jimmy).
Which HS did you attend, Vino?
 
I went to Central Catholic, but lived in Clark district. My classmates didn't suffer "too" much, but their experience was different than the one I had with my coaches. I remember one guy in particular, a couple years older than me, who swam and played water polo at Clark and told some stories...
 
I still think it's nuts that Aaron Peirsol, Ian Crocker and Brendan Hansen all were World Record holders and teammates. Texas Swimming is the GOAT.
 
judging by the performance of Bowman-coached swimmers in Paris, I think the men's swimming program is in good hands.
 
So far we have a grand total of 6 swimming gold medals between men and women combined with swimming almost finished. Phelps won 6 golds by himself in Athens. Our US swimming team has not been able to seal the deal this year and I wonder if we need to revamp the program. The team coach has little to do with swimmer development but still, this is not a great year for USA swimming.
 
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