Men's swimming and diving coach Adam Hoyt didn't need a grace period.
In only his second season at the helm, Hoyt led the Jumbos to a 9-1 dual meet record, a second-place finish at the NESCAC Championships, nine new school records and an unprecedented seven-member delegation to NCAA Nationals. And on Tuesday, his success was rewarded with NESCAC Coach of the Year honors.
"He's an extremely motivating coach," senior quad-captain Jason Kapit said. "Swimming is a sport that has a large mental aspect to it, and he makes us believe anything is possible."
The circumstances of Hoyt's ascendancy to the head coaching position in 2004 were less than ideal, as 34-year coach Don Megerle took an unexpected one-year leave of absence that ended up being permanent.
Coming from an assistant coaching position at Trinity, Hoyt took no notice of his temporary status and set about to aggressively change the way his team thought about swimming, the way it practiced, and the way it won.
"Some coaches could write workouts that beat you into the ground and make you too tired, and others could write some that don't challenge you enough," Kapit said. "Hoyt writes very good workouts, ones that are well thought-out and put us into good shape without destroying us."
In his first season, Hoyt breathed new life into the program, leading the Jumbos to a fourth-place finish at NESCACs and a 7-1 dual-meet record, with their only loss coming to Div. I Boston College. The team qualified two swimmers for Nationals and posted several record-breaking swims.
But Hoyt had higher things in mind for the Jumbos, and higher his team went. After racing out to a 6-0 start this season, including several meets that were so lopsided that a "mercy rule" went into effect, the Jumbos finished with a 9-1 dual-meet record, the only blemish coming to a Williams team that eventually won the NESCAC Championship by a large margin. But it is the Jumbos' accomplishments in the past two weeks that have catapulted 2005-2006 to the top of the record books.
The second-place finish at NESCACs was Tufts' highest since the tournament's inception in the 2000-2001 season. The team has qualified a record seven swimmers for NCAA Nationals, and eight Jumbos earned All-NESCAC honors at the conference championship meet. These accomplishments added to a Jan. 18 192.5-155.5 win over BC, the only team to have beaten the Jumbos last year, complete with nine new Hamilton Pool records, made this season that much sweeter.
"[Hoyt] had already had an outstanding first year with eight pool records, and we all expected going into this year to improve on that," senior Jon Godsey said. "He kept a similar program and added a little more yardage and intensity, and it paid off."
According to his swimmers, Hoyt is taking the Tufts swimming and diving program in the right direction. The team's showings during Hoyt's tenure have drawn national recognition to the program and will likely attract better and better swimmers.
"With as well as everyone did this year, he'll have an easier time recruiting," Godsey said. "It can't hurt that in his first two years, we set 17 school records and this year we qualified seven guys for Nationals. He's putting Tufts on the map on the national level as one of the top 15 programs in the country."
Members of the team agree on the national spotlight shone upon Tufts with the success of the 2005-2006 season, and seven Jumbos - Godsey, Kapit, senior quad-captain Brett Baker, juniors Greg Bettencourt, Mike Kinsella, and Justin Fanning, and freshman Andrew Shields - will get a chance to validate this attention in two weeks at Nationals in Minneapolis, Minn.
"A lot of swimming coaches around the country are starting to take notice of what we're doing," Kapit said. "The times and speeds we've posted this season are worthy of recognition, and we're going to get a chance to really prove that on the national stage."
