Here to Stay
December 06, 2007 09:40 AM | General
December 6, 2007
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| Vic Riggs |
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – The first few months at a new job is always a hectic time. Many challenges present themselves such as the rigors of a long move, uprooting your family, adjusting to your new surroundings and striving to make a good first impression.
All those challenges and more have accompanied new West Virginia swimming and diving Coach Vic Riggs to Morgantown as he looks to keep the momentum going from last season’s success. Hired in August, Riggs had less than two months to prepare for the team’s first meet. The transition has been a whirlwind process.
“It’s been rather fast and furious and it’s very exciting. This is something my wife and I have been working toward for the last 10 years,” Riggs said.
Riggs comes to WVU from Georgia, where he served as an assistant coach for the Bulldogs for one season. Prior to his stint at Georgia, Riggs coached at USC under Mark Schubert, guiding numerous Trojan sprinters and breaststrokers to All-America recognition. He also was the recruiting coordinator for the Trojans.
Riggs admits that the transition from being a top assistant to a head coach has been a challenging and enlightening experience so far.
“As the head coach everything basically ends with you. You are responsible for every aspect of the program,” Riggs said. “All the little things that go unseen by the assistant coaches that the head coaches have to do are probably the biggest adjustment. All the administrative little details that are coming at you each week or every few days are probably the biggest difference.”
Riggs says one of the many attractions he had for this job was the fact that former Coach Sergio Lopez had experienced success and showed that is was possible to build a stable and winning program in Morgantown.
“He came in a little over four years ago and brought stability and success to the program. He won the BIG EAST on the men’s side and the women’s team was progressively getting better each year,” Riggs said. “The program was solid and could be developed further.”
Riggs sees this job as a long-term opportunity where he can lead a major Division I program for the remainder of his coaching career. Originally from New Jersey, Riggs and his wife Renee, who hails from Pennsylvania, have worked to put him in position to lead a major program in the Northeast.
“I can come in and build a program around my philosophies and beliefs and recruit great student-athletes. I also thought this was a long-term position,” Riggs said. “That was one of the things that I addressed repeatedly on my on-campus interviews. I’ve moved several times in the past eight years trying to put myself in position for a head coaching job that I thought I could be at until I wanted to retire.
“(Director of Athletics Ed) Pastilong asked me why West Virginia? With your resume when you have been at programs that are in the Top 10 and in Georgia’s case in the Top 3 or 4,” Riggs said. “I told him that the one thing I haven’t done is build a program that a University can be proud of and that takes more than two or three years.”
Riggs coaching philosophies are based on giving maximum effort no matter the odds, practicing like you swim in meets, and excelling both in the water and in the classroom.
“In swimming I’m a big believer that what you put into the sport is what you’re going to get out of the sport. It’s very important for people to understand the side aspects that swimming teaches,” Riggs said. “You don’t always have to finish first to be successful. There are always members on swim teams that have great success that goes unnoticed. Everybody can succeed on their own level.
“We’re going to be a program that is competitive in all our races. My training really relates to how I want the kids to swim in meets,” Riggs said. “I design my workouts to build confidence in the kids and allow them to race the way we train.”
With such a late start this season Riggs has focused his initial recruiting efforts on West Virginia kids that have expressed an interest in the program. After a few years of success and stability in the program, Riggs hopes to extend his recruiting efforts throughout the nation.
“I think with my coaching reputation and my coaching connections in the club ranks and mainly on the West Coast that once people see what’s going on here that the regional area will also expand throughout the country,” Riggs said.
The fact that he is here to stay is another factor that Riggs believes will boost recruiting three or four years down the road.
“Once I have been here a few years I think it will be a huge advantage that there is stability in the swimming and diving program and I think it’s yearning for stability,” Riggs said. “That’s probably the hardest part of my job is to convince recruits that I am going to be here for the long haul.”
The program is a little bit small in numbers at the moment due to some attrition between coaching staffs. The men’s team has 15 members while the women’s side shows 21. Riggs plans to bring in 10 new male recruits this year and by his third year, he hopes to have a full team of 25 swimmers on each side.
“I have just told the kids the program is what it is. We are a little bit small but we just need to band together,” Riggs said. “In the dual meet situations it will be a little bit tougher but I think at BIG EAST we’ll match up a lot better.”
Riggs believes both the men’s and women’s team can each compete in the top half of the BIG EAST this year while also qualifying several members for the NCAA Championships.
His long-term goals however are a bit loftier, both in the pool and in the classroom.
“By the third year that I am here I would like WVU swimming to be one of the top athletic and academic programs in the conference,” Riggs said. “My recruits come here knowing they are not only going to be expected to perform in the water but in the classrooms as well. Long term I think we can be one of the Top 10 to 15 programs in the country.”
