- Auburn Tigers swimming and diving
infobox College swim team
imagesize = 75 px
hex1 = #000066
hex2 = #FE8835
founded = 1932
conference =Southeastern Conference
conferenceshort = SEC
history = 17 SEC Championships, 12 NCAA Championships since 1993
home pool =James E. Martin Aquatics Center
city = Auburn
state = Alabama
stateabb = AL
color1 =Navy blue
color2 =Burnt orange
coach =Richard Quick
men's ncaa = 7 (1997, 1999, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007)
women's ncaa = 5 (2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007)
men's conference = 14
women's conference = 5The Auburn Tigers swimming and diving program is
Auburn University 's most successful athletic program. The men's and women's teams have combined for 12 NCAA national championships. The men have won seven (1997, 1999, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007) while the women have won five (2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007). Former head coachDavid Marsh stepped down at the end of the 2006-2007 season. He was replaced by former Auburn,Texas Longhorns andStanford University head coachRichard Quick .History
Auburn's swimming and diving program got off to a modest start in 1932. Swimming in the basement of the Alumni Gym (which no longer exists on campus) the Tigers swam in a small pool which only had room for three lanes. Swimmers were timed and results were telegraphed to other schools for comparisons. The first real competitions were held in 1936, with ten swimmers competing. The Tigers first swam in the SEC Championships in 1940 and placed 5th. With the outbreak of World War II, Auburn stopped all intercollegiate sports and swimming was not reinstated after the war due to inadequate facilities.
The team was reinstated in 1947, and reentered the SEC Championships by 1948. Auburn's new pool was built in 1970 as the SEC swimming teams started to gain recognition nationally. Auburn finished 3rd in the SEC and 17th in the NCAA meet in 1974, the highest finish in school history at that time. The Tigers climbed up to second in the NCAA's by 1978, in which Auburn captured the first individual NCAA champion in school history when Scott Spann won the 200 IM and the convert|100|yd|sing=on breaststroke. Women's swimming was added as a SEC and NCAA sport (before 1982 it was an AWIA sport) in 1982, after the women's Auburn team was already competing. The women finished fourth in that year.
In 1990, Auburn hired
David Marsh who would take the Tigers to new heights. He led the 1994 men to an SEC title, the first in school history. That same year, the Tiger women won the convert|200|yd|sing=on medley relay, becoming the first team outside of Stanford, Texas, or Florida to win a NCAA title in a relay at the NCAA meet. The men would go on to win the 1997 National Championship, the first team in Auburn history to win an NCAA title. The women swimmers became the first Auburn women's team to win an NCAA title in 2002. The women would then win the SEC title in 2003 for the first time, with the men also winning an SEC Championship (their seventh consecutive) marking the first time the men's and women's SEC championships were held by the same school. Later that year, the Auburn teams combined to sweep the NCAA titles, another first for men's and women's teams coached by the same person. Auburn had established itself as a national swimming power.cite web |url=http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/aub/sports/c-swim/auto_pdf/2005-06-Media-Guide-Part-4.pdf |title=Auburn Swimming and Divig Media Guide|publisher= Auburn University Athletics Department |accessdate=2007-03-19]David Marsh's career as Auburn Head Coach ended in March 2007 after leading the Tigers to the 2007 Men's and Women's national titles in his fourth sweep of the events. Marsh finished with 17 SEC Championships and a record-tying 12 National Championships. The coach he tied is incoming Tigers coach Richard Quick who won 12 combined national titles as the Women's Head Coach for Texas and Stanford.
In 2008 the Auburn women finished second to Arizona while the men finished in fifth place.
Facilities
The Auburn Swimming and Diving program competes in the
James E. Martin Aquatics Center . The center first opened in the 1993 and was designed to be one of the premiernatatorium s in collegiate swimming and diving. The James E. Martin Aquatics Center has hosted multiple competitions including the SEC Championships three times, the NCAA Championships twice, as well the 1995, 2000, and 2005 U.S. Open competitions. In the months leading up to the Atlanta Olympic Games swimming teams fromIsrael ,China ,Japan ,South Africa , andFinland used the facility to train while the US OlympicWater Polo also used the facility.cite web |url=http://auburntigers.cstv.com/facilities/aub-facilities-swim.html |title= Auburn's James E. Martin Aquatics Center|publisher= Auburn University Athletics Department |accessdate=2007-08-06]The facility cost $10.5 million dollars and was a pet project of its namesake, former Auburn University President James E. Martin. Seating at the center has room for 1,000 spectators and an additional 800 poolside seats for competitors. The competition pool features a state of the art gutter system that absorbs waves instead of reverberating back into the pool, which creates a calmer swimming surface. The bulkheads also provide a flow-through design to prevent waves on turns. The pool is nine feet deep at the shallowest and convert|16.5|ft|m below the diving apparatus. The entire pool is convert|77|yd long (232 ft) and 25 yards (75 ft) wide. The bulkheads are movable and allow variable lengths for competition and practice as well as simultaneous diving. The facility also features the original Auburn competition pool, renovated as a warm-up and practice pool.cite web |url=http://auburntigers.cstv.com/facilities/aub-facilities-swim.html |title= Auburn's James E. Martin Aquatics Center|publisher= Auburn University Athletics Department |accessdate=2007-08-06]
In the summer of 2007, Auburn University completed work on a new $1 million dollar outdoor training pool, part of a large scale effort by the Auburn Athletics Department to improve the school's facilities.cite web |url=http://www.al.com/birminghamnews/stories/index.ssf?/base/sports/1183192044301010.xml&coll=2|title= Trustees quickly open checkbook for 92.5 million arena|publisher= Birmingham News |accessdate=2007-08-06] Head Coach Richard Quick believes the pool will push Auburn's swimming facilities to elite statuscite web |url= http://www.al.com/press-register/stories/index.ssf?/base/sports/1182417717220020.xml&coll=3&thispage=3
title= Trustees Quick Time|publisher= Mobile Press Register |accessdate=2007-08-06] and improving Auburn's recruiting efforts.Men's Swimming and Diving
On top of their seven national titles, the Auburn men have dominated the SEC. Since their first SEC Championship in 1994, Auburn has won 13 out of the last 14 SEC titles, including 11 straight since 1996. Only Tennessee has broken Auburn's streak. Between January 11th 2001 and January 11th 2007 Auburn did not lose a single dual meet (meets in between 2 or 3 teams only). The only team to beat Auburn during that time period was arch swimming rival Texas.
The 2006 Men's Swimming and Diving senior class, consisting of Kurt Cady, George Bovell, Eric Shanteau, and Doug Van Wie finished as the only senior class in AU History for any sport to go undefeated their entire college career. They never lost a Dual, SEC, or NCAA meet.
The 2007 Men's SEC Championship team dominated the conference competition, winning by 114.5 points over the second place Florida. The men's team won 11 individual conference titles, including sweeping all diving and relay events.Like the conference, Auburn's men dominated the 2007 NCAA championship meet. The Tigers scored 566 points in the meet, easily outdistancing second place Stanford who scored 397 points, a difference of 169. On the very first swim of the meet, the convert|200|yd|sing=on freestyle relay, the Tigers set a new NCAA record in the prelims which they then broke in the championship final (1:14.71). Auburn would go on to set NCAA records in four more events, the 50 Free (Cesar Cielo, 18.69), 100 Free (Cesar Cielo, 41.17), the 400 Free relay (2:46.56), and the 200 Medley Relay (1:23.37). Cesar Cielo became the first Auburn swimmer since Rowdy Gaines to win the 100 Free national title, and the first Auburn swimmer to win the 100 and 50 free in the same NCAA meet. Auburn diver Steven Segerlin repeated his 2006 Platform diving championship and won the 3M Springboard title to go with his third place in the 1M Springboard. Auburn was awarded for its dominance by sweeping the post meet awards, David Marsh was named NCAA Division I Men's Swimming Coach of the Year, head diving coach Jeff Shafer was named NCAA Division I Men's Diving Coach of the Year, Cesar Cielo was named NCAA Division I Men's Swimmer of the Year and Steven Segerlin was named NCAA Division I Men's Diver of the Year.cite web |url=http://www.al.com/auburn/birminghamnews/index.ssf?/base/sports/1174207691170660.xml&coll=2 |title=Auburn swimmers roll to fifth straight NCAA title |publisher= The Birmingham News |accessdate=2007-03-19] cite web |url=http://auburntigers.cstv.com/sports/c-swim/recaps/031707aag.html
title=Men's Swimming And Diving Win Its Fifth Consecutive National Championship |publisher= Auburn Tigers Official Website |accessdate=2007-03-19]Women's Swimming and Diving
Auburn's women's team has won five of the last six national titles (2002, 2003, 2004, 2006 and 2007) and the SEC Champions four out of the last five years (2003, 2004, 2005, 2007). Only Georgia has finished ahead of Auburn for both those championships. In 2005, Auburn lost to Georgia by two points at the NCAA championships and in the SEC Championships in 2006. The second place finisher at the SEC championships went on to win the national championship while the SEC champion won national runner-up for those two years. The 2007 SEC Championships saw the close competition between the Dogs and Tigers come to an end, as Auburn beat Georgia by 228 points while Georgia finished 5th in the NCAA championships to Auburn's first place finish. At the 2007 SEC Championships the women posted a school record for individual conference titles won at 12, at took home 19 All-American honors for the National Championships.cite web |url=http://auburntigers.cstv.com/sports/c-swim/recaps/031007aad.html
title=Women's Swimming And Diving Claims Another National Championship |publisher= Auburn Tigers Official Website |accessdate=2007-03-19]NCAA National Team Championships
The Tigers have won a combined 12 NCAA National Championships. When looking at all time results with men's and women's championships combined, the Auburn Tigers rank second behind Texas and Stanford who have 16 combined championships. The Auburn women rank third all time with 5 National titles behind Stanford (8) and Texas (7). The Auburn men rank fifth all time with 7 NCAA titles behind Michigan (11), Ohio State (10), USC and Texas (9 each), and Stanford (8). With their 2007 National title, Auburn's men joined Michigan and Indiana as the only teams to win five national tiles in a row.cite web |url=http://www.ncaasports.com/swimming/mens/history
title=All Time NCAA Men's Swimming and Diving Champions |publisher= NCAA |accessdate=2007-03-22] cite web |url=http://www.ncaasports.com/swimming/womens/history
title=All Time NCAA Women's Swimming and Diving Champions |publisher= NCAA |accessdate=2007-03-22]cite web| url=http://auburntigers.cstv.com/sports/c-swim/spec-rel/aub_womens_ncaa_championships.html |title=Auburn Swimming & Diving Women's Individual NCAA Champions|publisher= Auburn University Athletics Department|accessdate=2007-03-19]
Auburn Swimmers in International Events
Auburn has sent many swimmers to the Olympic games and other international competitions Auburn Swimmers compete for their home countries in events such as the Goodwill Games, Pan-Pacific Games, World University Games and the FINA World Championships, which is similar to the World Cup in soccer, where Auburn Swimmers have won as of 2006 18 gold medals.
2007 Pan-American Games
At the 2007
Pan-American Games Auburn swimmers won a school record 13 medals including eight golds. The Top Auburn swimmers in the event were Cesar Cielo with two golds and a Pan-Am Record of 51.28 in the 50 freestyle. Cielo won two more medals on relay teams. Emily Kukors of Auburn won two golds, becoming the first Auburn female swimmer to win multiple golds in the Pan-American games, in the 800 free and the 400 free relay for the USA team.Auburn Olympians
In the most well known international swimming competition, the Olympics, 30 Auburn swimmers and divers have competed for 14 countries with 8 swimmers taking home medals. Auburn coaches David Marsh and Jeff Shaffer as well as incoming coach Richard Quick have all coached US teams in the Olympics as well. The two most successful Auburn Olympians are
Rowdy Gaines andKirsty Coventry . Gaines competed in the 1984 Los Angeles games, where he won three gold medals in the 100 Freestyle and in the 400 Free relay and the 400 Medley Relay for the United States of America. Coventry became the first Auburn woman swimmer to medal in an Olympics in the 2004 Athens games when she won gold, silver and bronze in the 200 backstroke, 100 backstroke, and the 200 Individual Medley respectively. She is the first and (as of 2008) the only person ever to medal in an individual event in the Olympics for her native country, Zimbabwe. In total for the 2004 Athens games, Auburn sent 12 athletes to the games with five medals, an Auburn record-tying performance for a single Olympics.cite web url=http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/aub/sports/c-swim/auto_pdf/2005-06-Media-Guide-Part-4.pdf |title=Auburn Swimming and Diving Media Guide|publisher= Auburn University Athletics Department |accessdate=2007-03-19]ummer Olympic Games Beijing 2008
The Swimmers of Auburn Tigers Cesar Cielo Filho and Kirsty Coventry had an amazing performance:
Beijing 2008
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