New swim coach brings high hopes

The newest and most impressive addition to the men's swim team isn't a freshman, but a well versed veteran of collegiate swimming. \nThis past June athletics director Michael McNeely named Ray Looze Jr. as the eighth head swimming coach in school history. Looze inherited a team that placed seventh in the Big Ten and 32nd overall last season. \nBut IU swimming programs of the past are filled with tradition and six national championships and 23 Big Ten titles. So far Looze likes what he sees with the team, but he knows that heavy recruiting is needed to give more depth to the team in order to win championships..\nLooze does not believe this team has a lack of talent to bring their rankings back to the Top 20.\n"We had three swimmers and one diver qualify for the NCAA's last year," Looze said. "We have seven or eight guys that could make the 2003 NCAA's in a perfect world. If we do that, I think we have the program more than pointed back in the right direction."\nLooze's positive outlook for the season has his swimmers looking upbeat as well.\n"I really like him," sophomore butterflyist Murph Halasz said. "He is very positive, very idealistic. He is hard but fair, and he knows what he is talking about. He is pushing us to do what we should have been doing all along."\nEarly in the season the Hoosiers are 1-0 in the Big Ten Conference and are 2-0 overall, but their schedule will only get harder as the season progresses. \nLooze comes to IU with an impressive resumé. His last job was as head men's and women's swimming coach at the University of the Pacific (1997-2002). During his reign at Pacific, Looze was named the Big West Men's Swimming Coach-of-the-Year four times and once as the Big West Women's Swimming Coach-of-the-Year. This past season Looze led both teams to the Big West Championships. The men's team ended University of California-Santa Barbara's string of 23-consecutive conference championships and earned its first title since 1974. At the same meet, the Pacific women's team which featured three All-America selections won its first-ever Big West title and ended the season placing 15th overall at the NCAA Championships.\nPrior to coaching at Pacific, Looze was the head coach at the Peddie School in Highstown, NJ, from 1993-95. During this time, he led the prestigious prep school to Swimming World's mythical national championship. Looze was a men's swimming graduate assistant at the University of Texas when the Longhorns won the 1991 NCAA National Championship. Looze was also a men's swimming assistant coach at Harvard University from 1992-1993. At the club level, Looze coached the Phoenix Swim Club from 1995-96. He also coached at Tiger Aquatics in Stockton, Calif. during his tenure at Pacific. \nLooze is not only a nationally recognized coach, but was also a nationally acclaimed swimmer. Looze, a native of the San Francisco bay area, was a four-time All America selection and placed in the top-10 in eight NCAA Championship events during his career at the University of Southern California. He finished second in the 400-yard IM at the 1990 NCAA Championships and earned a spot on the 1990 Goodwill Games team. At the 1992 U.S. Olympic Trials, Looze just missed qualifying for the games placing third in the 400 IM and fifth in the 200 IM. \nLooze performed well in the pool and in the classroom. He became the first non-football playing Trojan in school history to earn GTE/CoSIDA Academic All-America honors. He was named USC's Scholar-Athlete of Year and a finalist for the Rhodes Scholarship in 1989. In 1990, Looze was a finalist for the NCAA Byers Award. He was also an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship winner. He graduated from USC with a Bachelor's degree in business finance with summa cum laude honors. Looze went on to graduate school at the University of Texas, Austin, and earned a Master's degree from the School of Education. \n"Our mission is to prepare student-athletes for championship competition," McNeely said in a press release. "This means performance in the classroom, and in life. We are fully confident that Ray will provide outstanding leadership for successfully building upon the IU swimming program's championship history"