James Sweeney Resigns from Head Swim & Dive Coach Position

WESTON, Mass. – After nine years as head coach of the Regis College men's and women's swimming and diving teams, James Sweeney has announced that he will be leaving effective August 13, 2021, to become the Aquatics Director at the Peabody YMCA, where he will also be a member of the administrative team.

Sweeney has guided the Pride swimming and diving program to new heights, as the men's and women's teams have combined for 83 individual and 17 relay GNAC championships. At the NEISDA Championships during Sweeney's tenure, Kiet Luong earned five New England titles, Nicholas Rainville and Sarah Leonard captured two titles apiece, and Alex Graf won the 50 butterfly during Sweeney's first season.

The women finished second at the GNAC Championships seven times and within the top 10 at the NEISDA Championships in each of the last five meets, highlighted by a program-best fifth place finish in February 2020. The Pride men posted a top-three GNAC finish and a top-10 NEISDA placement, highlighted by a program-best fourth place finish in 2016, in each of the eight competition seasons with Sweeney at the helm.

Sweeney was voted GNAC Men's Swimming & Diving Coach of the Year in both 2018 and 2019 as the team finished second at the GNAC Championships and featured the GNAC Male Swimmer of the Year both times: Rainville in 2018 and Joshua Unas in 2019. The men's team received the GNAC Institutional Sportsmanship Award in 2018, while the women's squad earned that honor from the conference coaches in 2019.

"It has been a great honor and privilege to serve as the head men's and women's swimming and diving coach and aquatics director here at Regis. With all the tremendous stats and accolades my teams and I have accomplished over the nine years, I will certainly miss the incredible people that I have had a chance to work for and with here the most," Sweeney said. "Thank you to all of our former and current swimmers and divers who helped our program compete with pride and excellence in the classroom and in the pool. I will certainly treasure my time at Regis and all of the relationships that I made. I wish nothing but continued excellence and success for the program along with the Regis community."

During Sweeney's tenure, every current men's swimming school record except one as well as 12 swimming and three diving school records currently on the women's side were established, as school records were broken a total of 120 times. Regis swimmers have posted several NCAA "B" qualifying times over the past nine years, and Elisabeth McQuaid qualified for the 2019 NCAA Division III Northeast-North Regional Diving Championship.

In the classroom, Sweeney's teams have excelled, with numerous Academic All-GNAC and NEISDA All-Academic individual honors. In the past nine years, the women's team has collected 17 CSCAA Scholar All-America Team awards, while the men's squad has accumulated 14 CSCAA Scholar All-America Team honors. Most recently, Thalia Bowie received the Regis-Casserly Award and Senior Scholar-Athlete Award.

The search for a new head men's and women's swimming and diving coach will commence immediately. The job listing is available here.