The New England Small College Athletic Conference is one of the most competitive Division III conferences in the NCAA, and Wesleyan Swimming is looking to make an impact.<\/p>\n

With four men\u2019s teams and three women\u2019s teams ranked in the top 25, it\u2019s a challenge to fight your way to the top of the pack. Yet, Wesleyan Swimming\u2019s head coach Peter Solomon is ready to take it on and transform his teams into top-three NESCAC programs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel that we have all the ingredients to quickly become one of the top teams in the NESCAC Conference, and by doing so, we can also become a Top 10 team in Division III,\u201d Solomon said. \u201cFortunately for us, some of the best Division III programs in the country are fellow NESCAC schools.\u201d<\/p>\n

The head coach boasts a resume of coaching schools in the NESCAC. In 1993, Solomon took the reigns as the head coach at Amherst College, until leaving in 1997. That year, he became the head coach of Middlebury College, where he remained until 2011. Now, in his third season at Wesleyan, Solomon is putting the pieces in place to take his team to the next level.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo accomplish these lofty goals is similar to putting a jigsaw puzzle together,\u201d he said. \u201cIt requires finding all the right pieces and putting them together one piece at a time.\u00a0 Even in the short time that I’ve been at the helm here at Wesleyan, I’ve seen a turning of the tide.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since 2012, Solomon has helped to double the men\u2019s roster size and as a result has added more depth to the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe men’s team has doubled in size from the 11 men that were on the roster when I first took over the team in 2012,\u201d Solomon said. \u201cWe graduated 5 seniors last year and brought in 17 freshmen this season.\u00a0 Wesleyan had its first NCAA Qualifier in more than six\u00a0years last season when Angela Slevin qualified in both the 500 and 1650 freestyle.\u201d<\/p>\n

With these successes in hand, Solomon hopes to ride this momentum and continue building a team that has more swimmers qualifying for NCAA Championships in March. The head coach strongly believes that \u201cHappy swimmers are Faster swimmers\u201d and that is something he cites as one of the most important lessons he has learned from being a coach.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are a lot of variables that go into fast\u00a0swimming,\u201d he said. \u201cBut, one of the most important ingredients to fast swimming is team dynamics and a supportive and competitive team environment where swimmers swim not just for themselves, but for their teammates and coaches.\u201d<\/p>\n