William Jewell College formally introduced Mark Gole as their new men's and women's swimming coach today. The 15-year veteran swim coach will take over the reinstated men’s and women’s varsity teams with competition scheduled for 2011-12.William Jewell will move to the Great Lakes Valley Conference of the NCAA Division II next year and will join fellow conference schools Drury University, Indianapolis University, University of Missouri S&T (men only) and Lewis University as schools that currently sponsor swimming and diving.Gole has spent the last six seasons as head swimming coach at Truman State University. While there, he helped lead the women’s team to the 2006 and 2008 NCAA Division II national championship. His women’s teams also finished second and fourth in the nation in 2007 and 2009 respectively. He has coached two individual national champions and recruited and coached the first ever Rhodes Scholar to attend Truman State.
“We are thrilled to attract someone with Mark’s experience and proven success to lead our new swimming program,” said Athletic Director Dr. Darlene Bailey. “He knows what it means to win championships. He also shares Jewell’s commitment to student-athlete success in the classroom as well as in the competitive arena.” Gole will begin his coaching duties at William Jewell in January.
Gole, a native of Grand Rapids, Mich., began his coaching career in 1995 with the Rockford (Mich.) Riptide summer program as an assistant coach. From 1998-2005 he served as the senior assistant coach with the Oakland (Mich.) Live Y’ers.
Gole served as an assistant coach at Wayne State University (Mich.) from 2000-2005. He helped produce seven national qualifiers for the Pioneers in 2005, one of their most successful campaigns in school history.
Gole is now looking forward to helping re-establish the William Jewell swim program. “I am excited to get started,” said Gole. “It is going to be challenging and exciting at the same time. It has actually been a dream of mine to have my stamp on a program from day one. To have that opportunity at such a historic and very reputable institution as William Jewell College makes it even more exciting for me.”
He is a 1999 graduate of Oakland University (Mich.), where he received his degree in communications. While there he was a member of three consecutive NCAA Division II men’s national championship teams (1995-97). He was a member of three national champion relay teams during his time at Oakland and was a 16-time All-American and GLIAC Swimmer of the Year in 1996.
