Good Luck Bret Lundgaard

Bret Lundgaard, as TigerBlog learned yesterday, attended the University of Washington, where he was a journalism major.

Had he known that, TB would have asked Lundergaard about it. Did he go to college thinking he'd get into the profession? Or did he always want to be a coach, in his case, a swimming coach, which is what he has been at Princeton with the women since 2017. 

For his part, TB never took a college journalism class. Perhaps if he had, he would have ended up as a swimming coach, just like Lundgaard did? Instead, TB majored in American history and became a writer. 

It's interesting how those things can work, right? 

This has all gotten TB to wondering what you are taught in college journalism classes. Everything he learned, he learned while he was working at the newspaper way back when, that, plus reading writers he liked and copying their styles. 

Until he read that Lundgaard had majored in journalism, he never wondered about what the curriculum was. And now Lundgaard is leaving, so asking him has become more difficult. 

Lundgaard's tenure with the Tigers ended this week when it was announced that he was leaving Princeton this week to become the head coach of the men's and women's programs at the University of Kentucky. The Wildcats are getting a great coach, not to mention someone with a great sense of humor who is very, very easy to like.

TB will remember Lundgaard mostly for his squash matches against Craig Sachson, who was the swimming and diving contact here when Lundgaard started. Apparently the two of them had some tremendous battles.

In fact, TB asked Sachson to write a guest blog about Lundgaard, and Craig said he would — just not yesterday. TB will bring that to you sometime between now and the end of the summer.

What's the hardest thing for a coach to do? 

Is it to take over a program that is on the bottom and turn it into a winner? Yes, that obviously is a huge challenge.

Or is it taking over for an overwhelmingly successful longtime coach? There are probably more instances where someone turned a loser into a winner than there are of someone who took over for the legend and succeeded as well.

That is not easy.

Teeter coached at Princeton for 33 years. In many ways, she was Princeton women's swimming and diving. When she stepped aside, Lundgaard took her spot. 

And how did he do? Well, he certainly achieved enough to become the head coach of an SEC program. That says a lot about what he did with the Tigers.

In his time at Princeton, Lundgaard coached his team to the 2020 and 2023 Ivy League champions. Also, from the release on his hire at Kentucky:

While at Princeton, Lundgaard produced a total of 21 Ivy League individual champions while coaching 57 student-athletes to All-Ivy League status, including 28 on the first team. The Tigers also were named a CSCAA Scholar All-America Team every season from 2017-2023. The program boasts a 42-12 dual meet record during Lundgaard’s tenure and a 27-8 mark in the Ivy League.

That's success.

Kentucky swims in a powerful conference. Is there any sport in which the SEC isn't good? 

The Wildcat women finished third in the league and 19th in the country last year. The men's team was eighth in the league and 28th in the country. 

Actually, make that tied for 28th in the country. And with whom did Kentucky tie? 

Princeton.

Kentucky women's swimming won its first SEC title ever in 2021. The men have never won an SEC title, and the championship meet dates to 1937. It doesn't help that Florida has won 44 of the championships, but hey, it's good to have a challenge.

That's certainly what faces Lundgaard. 

As for the Tigers, the women's swimming and diving program had four head coaches in its first 13 years and now has had two in the 39 years since.

The most recent of them, Brett Lundgaard, now heads off for his next stop, in Lexington. He leaves a program that is coming off two championships in three seasons, and he leaves as the reigning Ivy Coach of the Year.

He certainly did at Princeton what is not easy to do anywhere. He followed the legend and did well.