New Mexico State head swimming and diving coach Rick Pratt announced Thursday that former Aggie assistant Jonathan Johnson will return to NMSU this season as the program's new diving coach.

Johnson served under former Aggie head coach Mark McFarland for five seasons at NMSU before taking the job as head diving coach at the United States Military Academy in West Point, New York back in 2001. He now returns to Las Cruces to take over the diving program and help build NMSU into one of the premiere teams in the Western Athletic Conference.

"Jonathan is the complete package when it comes to a diving coach," Pratt said. "Not only is he an amazing coach with a tremendous amount of experience, but he is also a great recruiter and will be a vital part of the this team. Jonathan's knowledge of this area, his knowledge of this school and his love for the Aggies is also a huge asset."

"I really enjoyed my time at West Point and I appreciated the chance to coach there, but it's a great feeling to know that I am coming home and get to work with a great athletics department and sports family," Johnson said. "One of the reasons I chose to pursue this opportunity was that athletics at NMSU are growing and the WAC is a great conference."

During his tenure at Army, Johnson was named the Patriot League Diving Coach of the Year three times and this past season Chelsea Haviland, an eight-time league champion, captured Diver of the Meet honors at the Patriot League Championships for the fourth consecutive year and became the first Army diver in school history to qualify for the NCAA Championships.

"Coaching the school's first diver to reach the NCAA Championships is a great accomplishment and he really grew that program from nothing to where it is today," Pratt said. "I feel so fortunate that we were able to get Jonathan back down here and I believe he is going to be able to compete against very strong competition in the WAC."

In all, Johnson has guided nine Army divers to the NCAA Zone Qualifying meet, including two in 2004-05 and Haviland this past season. In five years, Johnson's team's captured 10 Patriot League diving titles, two Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) crowns and produced four Eastern Intercollegiate Swimming League finalists.

"It is going to be nice to come back and work on rebuilding a program from scratch," Johnson said. "The swimming team is on an upswing and Rick (Pratt) has done a great job building that program and recruiting some quality athletes. I look forward to being part of the team and adding some divers to the mix."

Johnson joined the NMSU swimming and diving program as an assistant coach in September 1996 and helped build the diving team into a perennial conference championship contender. Johnson's divers placed in the top three at the Big West Conference Championships five times over a three-year span and his final season with NMSU concluded with a runner-up finish in the Aggies' first year competing at the Sun Belt Swimming and Diving Championships.

Prior to breaking into the collegiate coaching ranks, Johnson spent nine years as a high school diving coach in Indiana, during which time he developed six All-Americans, three state champions, four state runners-up and six top-eight finalists. His efforts did not go unnoticed as three times he was named Indiana's High School Coach of the Year.

Johnson served as the diving coach for Highland High School for two years prior to arriving at Lake Central High School in St. John, Ind., for an eight-year tour as the boys and girls' diving coach from 1988 to 1996. During that time he also coached the United States Diving Club based in Munster, Ind.

An All-American on the one-meter board while at Clarion University in 1987, Johnson earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Business from the University of Phoenix in 2001. As a prep athlete, Johnson was runner-up at the Indiana high school state diving championships in 1984 and 1985.

Despite having just 13 swimmers and no divers last season, the NMSU squad exceeded expectations in its first year under Pratt and the team's future appears very bright. The Aggies set three school records and took home two individual medals while finishing sixth at last year's WAC Championships. This season, Pratt and the Aggies return 12 of the 13 swimmers from 2005-06 while adding a talented recruiting class of seven swimmers and one diver to the mix.