After nearly 13 years at the helm of Georgetown’s swimming and diving program, Head Coach Bethany Bower has resigned, the athletic department announced Dec. 13 in a press release.
“We are grateful for Bethany’s service and guidance during her time here, and we wish her well in her future pursuits,” Athletic Director Bernard Muir said in the statement.
The press release did not say why Bower had resignedprovide a reason for Bower’s resignation.
Assistant Coach Steven Cartwright was named interim head coach of men’s and women’s swimming for the rest of the reason, the release said.
Bower’s departure comes in the middle of the Hoyas’ worst season in recent memory. The women’s team finished the 2006 half of the season 1-5 (0-2 Big East), while the men check in at 0-6 and 0-2 in the conference. Neither team has performed this poorly since before 1999-2000, the last season for which the athletic department kept detailed records.
Still, Bower’s squad qualified 20 swimmers for the Big East championships a year ago, 20 more than this past winter.
Georgetown has struggled with a great deal of turnover on its roster. The current team includes just 12 men (11 swimmers and a single diver), all of whom are freshmen and sophomores, and 22 women, just two of whom are seniors.
Only five of the 13 underclassmen listed on the men’s roster at the start of the 2005-06 season returned this year. The women lost five of the 16 swimmers on last season’s roster.
Contacted the day before her resignation was announced, Bower declined to comment on whether or not she was resigning. She has not returned repeated requests for comment.
Cartwright, who joined the Hoyas as an assistant coach in 2004, is a 2001 graduate of Catholic University, where he was a two-time team MVP and the 2000 swimmer of the year in the Capital Athletic Conference. He holds the CUA record in the 200-meter butterfly.
Prior to joining the Georgetown leadership, Cartwright worked with several private swim teams, including nearby Rockville-Montgomery Swim Club in North Bethesda, Md. and the ontgomery County Swimming League. He also worked with the Seacoast Swimming Association in Dover, N.H.
Since assuming the reigns, Cartwright has led practices and accompanied the team on its annual training trip to Puerto Rico. He will oversee his first meet as the head coach this weekend against St. Bonaventure and West Virginia in Morgantown, W.Va.
In an interview the week after being hired, Cartwright admitted he was surprised that Bower’s departure came at midseason, but he declined to discuss the subject of his predecessor further. Calling the first part of the winter “an incredibly positive and successful season,” he noted that with four meets to go, the Hoyas already have posted 83 personal bests and 18 Big East Championships qualifiers – three of whom are in potential scoring position. The team has also broken three school records.
None of Georgetown’s 20 competitors scored at the league championships last season.
“We want to go into every meet trying to win,” he said.
“Our program will be in good hands during this time of transition with Steven Cartwright at the helm,” Muir added.
Cartwright will complete the winter season as the interim head coach, at which point the athletic department will conduct its standard, full-scale coaching search. Cartwright suggested that he does intend to enter his name into contention for the long-term position.
