With New Swim Coach, Longhorns Say They’re Having Fun, Ready to Return to National Glory

By Luke Lawhorn

Reporting Texas

Graduate student Emma Sticklen and the rest of the Texas women’s swimming and diving team have been knocking on the door of an NCAA championship over her first four years in Austin. 

Finishing third in 2021 and runner-up over the past three seasons, this year’s Longhorn squad, currently ranked No. 2 in the College Swimming and Diving Coaches Association of America poll, has an opportunity in March to win its first national title since 1991. The men, who won four titles between 2015 and 2021, are ranked No. 1 and have a chance to ignite another dominant run. 

To bring home the title, the women will have to overcome top-ranked Virginia, which has won the past four championships. Though the Cavaliers still stand in Texas’ way, this year’s team has a new face in the program that can propel both the men and women to the top of the podium.

Bob Bowman took over for longtime swim coach Eddie Reese last April after nine years at Arizona State and winning the men’s national championship last season. Though his primary role is the men’s head coach, Bowman is serving in a newly created position as the director of swimming and diving, meaning he oversees the women’s side as well. 

Veteran swimmers like Sticklen have felt his influence across both teams. 

“Having Bob here and having his energy and competitiveness and the fire that he brings, it does seep over in our side,” Sticklen said. “I always think that we are a better team when both teams are having fun.”

Bowman, the former coach of Olympics star Michael Phelps and the head men’s swim coach of the 2016 Rio Olympic Games, said he’s saved some of the traditions that Reese instilled in the program over his 46 years at the Forty Acres while also implementing his own. Among those has been combining the men’s and women’s teams multiple times a week for practice, which has benefited both teams. 

“We’ve been completely separate the last four years that I’ve been here,” Sticklen said. “It’s been really cool to see us come together on some things.”

Aside from the positive effects on the culture and camaraderie on the team, practicing together has helped improve performance. 

“I think it’s kind of allowed us to get more specifically tailored in our training,” said sophomore Erin Gemmell, who anchored Team USA’s 4×200 free relay to silver in the Paris Games. “When it’s just the women’s team, there’s only so many training groups we can have.”

The same can be said in diving, which is separate from the swimming team and has its own coach, Matt Scoggin, who’s been at UT for 30 years. 

Junior Nick Harris, an All-American in the 1-meter dive, said this season’s experience has been a “huge change” and the entire team is really close. 

“The one thing that I’ve noticed that’s picked up a little bit in the past year at least is the intensity and the atmosphere is different,” Harris said. “Everyone obviously wants to win super bad. Everyone’s doing whatever it takes to win this year. The biggest thing for me is the intensity under Bob, the grind.”

Bowman acknowledges the challenges of following Reese, who won 15 national titles as the men’s coach and was the winningest swim coach in NCAA history. But Bowman, already an inductee into the American Swimming Coaches Hall of Fame and a six-time winner of the USA Swimming Coach of the Year award, says he’s “uniquely positioned” to take the reins. 

“I’m just trying to continue it,” Bowman said. “The level that he created, we’re trying to kind of just keep that going and improve on it.”

Bowman, in the first of a six-year contract, said that Texas is a great place to coach swimming because it has unparalleled resources, facilities, history, tradition and support and “couldn’t pass it up.”

Bowman’s arrival isn’t the only difference in this year’s team. The men’s and women’s squads had several faces representing their countries in the Paris Olympic Games this past summer, combining for eight medals. 

Bowman said the success that the Longhorns had in the Games helped set the tone for this successful season. 

“I definitely think it has something to do with wherever we’re going because we had a very good Olympics,” Bowman said. “The people here swam quite well. Maybe it gives you momentum coming into the college (conference championships) and trying to build off that.”

Gemmell said her experience at the Olympics helped her enjoy competing at the college level. Representing your country at the highest level brings obvious pressure, so the collegiate environment eases some of those anxieties. 

“I think in some ways it kind of made everything for college seem a lot more fun, a lot less scary,” Gemmell said. “More like I’m out here to do what I can for my team.”

Athletes who didn’t get a chance to compete over the summer also felt the benefit of last season being an Olympic year. Sticklen, who didn’t qualify at the trials, said that she returned for her fifth year with new focus.

“I came in this year even more motivated, after not getting something that I wanted,” Sticklen said. “So I got a good break and then have been able to come back and crush it.”