University at Buffalo women’s swimming and diving head coach Andy Bashor has been named the head coach of the newly combined men’s and women’s swimming and diving program as announced by Athletics Director Warde Manuel on Thursday.

Bashor, who just completed his first season at UB, is no stranger to coaching a combined program. He spent four years as the head assistant coach of both the men’s and women’s programs at Rutgers University before coming to Buffalo in 2006. At the 2006 BIG EAST Conference Championships, the Scarlet Knights’ women’s team finished second and the men’s team finished fourth out of 11 squads.

“I have continually been impressed by Andy’s coaching ability, work ethic, preparation and plan,” Manuel said. “He has embraced the challenge and shared a vision regarding the benefits of a combined program. He has experience and has had success coaching a combined program before and I trust that he will achieve that same success at UB.”

It is not uncommon to have one head coach oversee a combined program as over half of the men’s teams ranked in the top 25 of Division I this year are combined. Eastern Michigan, another school with a combined program, won both the men’s and women’s titles at the 2007 Mid-American Conference Swimming and Diving Championships.

Any money derived from the transition to a combined program will be reinvested into the program in its quest to reach the top of the Mid-American Conference.

“This is an opportunity and a challenge that we are looking forward to,” Bashor said. “Being combined, it’s going to be a great opportunity to be able to lead both programs to win MAC championships. Both the men and the women are going to benefit. We are going to be a bigger, stronger family.”

In addition to the expanded duties for Bashor, Buffalo plans to add an assistant coach on the men’s side as well as a graduate assistant. The entire staff will work with both the men’s and women’s teams.

Bashor just completed his first season as the head coach of the women’s swimming and diving team. Under his tutelage, Meili Carpenter (Boulder, CO/Fairview) was named second-team All-MAC, Eugenie Viale (Le Lavondou, France/Lyce Jean Aicard) earned Academic All-MAC honors and the Bulls were named to the College Swim Coaches Association of America’s Academic All-American Team.