The University announced that they will be adding swim teams for men and women beginning fall 2015. The additions were made official on Nov. 20.
“I can say that I am very excited about bringing swimming back to Monmouth,” said President Paul Brown.
Vice President and Director of Athletics Marilyn McNeil highlighted the reasons why swimming was reinstated at Monmouth. “Because we have the pool. Because we are on the shore. Because we’ve had a fabulous swimming program in the past, it just made sense that swimming was the sport that we should go back to. We need to pull our alumni back and pull our friends back,” said McNeil.
A central reason why the University decided to add more sports teams was the “core sports requirement” that the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC) institutes. The MAAC requires that members of their conference have at least seven men’s and women’s teams.
Jeff Stapleton, Senior Associate Director of Athletics for Internal Operations, said, “One of the big reasons we’re adding swimming on the women’s side was we were missing a core sport on that side and one of the two core sports that we were missing, that we would have to add, was either volleyball or swimming.”
McNeil explained, “We actually did some due diligence, we studied it for over a year trying to figure out what would be the best thing that we could do. We also looked at the requirement and sort of thought about the sports that we were short of and what does it mean for the Jersey Shore. Swimming was the one that came forward and we really only had to add women’s swimming. It ended up that we wanted to add a sport.”
Although a Monmouth swim team has not competed since the 1982-83 academic year, the University has an established history of swimming success.
Eddy Occhipinti, Assistant Athletics Director for Marketing, said, “The history of the swimming program at Monmouth University is a very rich one. The program won numerous championships, both team and individual, and features an Olympian.”
Monmouth’s swimming history is highlighted by the 1974 team, which won both the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) and Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) National Championships. The team also had 16 All-Americans and featured Wendy Boglioli, who went on to win an Olympic gold medal in 1976 after completing her career at Monmouth. Additionally, there are currently six members of the Athletics Hall of Fame that were swimmers at the University.
“They have a long history of swimming here on campus, so we were hoping that it would be a natural fit to come back and start swimming back up as a core sport in the MAAC,” maintained Stapleton. “We would then build on the legacy that we have and maybe get more swimmers back involved from the alumni base.”
While the requirement from the MAAC and the history of Monmouth’s swim team were pertinent to the reintroduction of swimming, the fact that the campus already contains a swimming facility had a significant impact on the decision. The swimming facility, that is located within Boylan Gymnasium, is known as Richard E. Steadman Natatorium.
“It is a facility that isn’t under used, it’s used quite well, but it is a facility that we had and it was right here,” said McNeil.
Stapleton added, “We decided to add swimming because we have a facility. We have a swimming pool that wouldn’t affect the other teams.
Although there is a swimming facility on campus, it does not mean that the pool fits the collegiate criteria for hosting an event. “The pool is in yards and now they swim in meters, so that is a big difference. It is a 25 yard pool but I believe now the pool’s are 25 meters,” explained Stapleton. “I think there are a lot of older pools still in existence, so I think they could still host events here.”
McNeil believes that the pool could still host official college meets but said there is one problem with the pool. “It is regulation length. For the conference it is more than adequate,” said McNeil. “It’s biggest deterrent, it is a little shallow in the shallow end so you cannot complete really good competition turns.”
While it has been finalized that there will be a Monmouth men’s and women’s swimming team competing in the fall next year, there has not been a coached named or commitment from a recruit to this point. In order to build a competitive team for next fall, those decisions are expected to be made in the near future.
PHOTO COURTESY of Tara Cirincione
