Photo Courtesy: Tia Patron\/Tennessee Athletics<\/p>\n
SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, September 19. UTAH\u00a0head swimming and diving coach Joe Dykstra announced today additions and the restructuring of his staff for the 2014-15 season.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am so excited to announce these changes and additions to our staff,\u201d said Dykstra. \u201cI am truly blessed to have such a dynamic and hard-working staff that is so dedicated to the continued improvement of our program.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dykstra announced that assistant coach Jonas Persson has been promoted to head sprint coach and Michele Lowry has been named head distance coach following an outstanding 2013-14 season.<\/p>\n
\u201cPromoting Jonas to head sprint coach and Michele to head distance coach reflects their enormous contributions to our program, having both coached swimmers to new school records and Pac-12 titles last season,\u201d said Dykstra.<\/p>\n
Assistant coach James Winchester, who has handled an assortment of recruiting duties for the Utes, has been named recruiting director to go along with his stroke and IM coaching duties.<\/p>\n
\u201cJames does an amazing job recruiting and I am excited for him to take the overall lead in that critical area of our coaching efforts,\u201d Dykstra noted.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Tami Johnson, who served as an assistant swim coach the previous two seasons, has been named director of operations and alumni relations for the Utah swimming and diving program.<\/p>\n
\u201cHaving someone like Tami embrace the difficult work of connecting with the many decades of Utah Swimming & Diving Alumni will help us keep traditions alive and pride in this program,\u201d said Dykstra.<\/p>\n
Dykstra, who is in his second season at the helm of the swimming and diving program, announced Thursday the addition of assistant diving coach Tess Waresmith, to go along with the addition of Deniz Hekmati, who will serve as the primary strength and conditioning coach for the program.<\/p>\n
\u201cTess was a fantastic diver and we are excited for her to bring her knowledge of the sport to our divers and to help [head diving coach] Richard Marschner, especially when we have split gender meets and he has to be away from some of the divers,\u201d said Dykstra. \u201cWe are also really excited to bring on Deniz as our new strength and conditioning coach. We are now one of the very few programs to have a dedicated strength coach for swimming and diving, and his expertise and enthusiasm will help all of our athletes to reach higher levels than ever before.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Utah swimming and diving teams are coming off a 2013-14 season in which the squad turned out four All-Americans, 13 NCAA top 50 times and set 29 new school records.<\/p>\n
The Utah swimming and diving team will get the 2014-15 campaign underway next Friday with a women\u2019s Pac-12 meet against Stanford inside Ute Natatorium and will then host an alumni meet that following Saturday, Sept. 27.<\/p>\n