The Tigers took advantage of the final chance to leave a mark on McHugh Natatorium, the program’s home pool that closed out more than a year of renovations on Saturday with a final Senior Day meet. Five pool records fell—three in individual events and two in relays—as Clemson earned the sweep. Photo by Dawson Powers

By William Qualkinbush

CLEMSON — The cliché that records are never meant to be broken is always applicable—except for one instance.

Records cannot be surpassed if the competition in which they are broken has finality. In the case of the Clemson swimming and diving program, Saturday’s meet against Emory presented one of those rare opportunities.

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By William Qualkinbush

CLEMSON — The fact that Alex Brown is a freshman swimmer at Clemson is not extraordinary. Programs bring freshmen into school on an annual basis, often in highly publicized ways.

The fact that Brown is the only freshman swimmer at Clemson in the final year in the history of the program, however, makes him unique. At a time when many felt the need to transfer to other institutions in an effort to continue swimming at the collegiate level, Brown made the choice to join the Tiger team with full knowledge of the program’s fate.

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Anderson, Bruck shatter pool records to lead Clemson on Tobacco Road

By William Qualkinbush

DURHAM, N.C. — The Clemson men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams competed twice in a span of 18 hours over the weekend during a road trip to the state of North Carolina. The Tigers experienced mixed results as a team during the stretch and posted a slew of fast times competing against conference foes N.C. State and Duke, along with the Richmond women’s team.

On Friday night in Raleigh, the N.C. State men’s team defeated Clemson by a score of 149-83, while the Tiger women’s team was defeated by the Wolfpack 141-98. On Saturday in Durham, the Clemson men’s team eked out a victory over Duke by a single point, 156-155. The Tigers split on the women’s side, defeating Richmond 153-141 and falling to Duke 159-130.

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Clemson falls to South Carolina. Photo by Richard Shiro.

By William Qualkinbush

GREENVILLE, S.C. — Every athletic team has its tone-setter, its forte, its strength. It is the constant the team can count on to perform at a peak level when times are tough. Finding such an individual or unit can be difficult for a coach, but for Clemson swimming and diving head coach Christopher Ip, the answer is easy.

Identifying the strength, for Ip, could be whittled down by a simple process of elimination. Due to several defections related to the phasing-out of the program after this season, there are a few events where the leaders the coaching staff was counting on are no longer on the roster. [Read more...]

Brooks Teal is in his first season as an assistant swimming and diving coach at Clemson University, but he is no stranger to Clemson or to the program. The former N.C. State head man sat down with MyOrangeUpdate.com to discuss his coaching style, what he found when he arrived on campus, and what his expectations are for this year’s team.

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Stu Wilson is in his first season as a Clemson swimming assistant coach. A former head coach at Georgia Tech, Wilson sat down with MyOrangeUpdate.com to discuss how he got to Clemson, what he found in the program, and how he best relates to student-athletes.

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