As if the two-time defending NCAA Champions from Cal (both men and women) needed any more accolades, but here’s one more: unofficially, they are Olympic collegiate champions.
The current and former student-athletes from Cal combined for 11 Olympic medals, including 7 golds, in the swimming portion of the Olympic Games. The 11 total ties with the Florida Gators, interestingly the winners of the last 4 women’s NCAA Championships in combination, but the 7 golds won by the Bears of Berkeley gives good justification for why their mascot is “Golden”.
The 7 includes a pair from Nathan Adrian, a trio from Dana Vollmer, and one each from Jessica Hardy and incoming freshman Rachel Bootsma.
The Bears, in fact, would rank 2nd on the overall medal table if they were treated as their own country: still behind the US, but ahead of China and Australia.
Keep in mind that we counted each actual medal received, so in many cases a relay victory would earn a team many medals. In total, 16 different college programs were represented on the podiums. That goes to show that there is still some parity in the sport.
By conference, the Pac-12 still remains supreme with 25 total medals (remember that Jason Lezak’s Gauchos are now a part of the Pac-12 in men’s swimming). The SEC didn’t have as many huge numbers at the top, but still turned out an impressive 23 medals.
For what it’s worth, Stanford has 5 members of the gold-medal winning women’s water polo team in their yearbooks. On a 13-woman roster, that’s pretty impressive.
It’s very plausible that we missed a medal or two, so please let us know in the comments if you see any ommissions.
| Gold | Silver | Bronze | TOTAL | |
| Cal* | 7 | 1 | 3 | 11 |
| Florida* | 6 | 3 | 2 | 11 |
| USC* | 4 | 3 | 3 | 10 |
| Georgia* | 4 | 1 | 2 | 7 |
| Michigan | 3 | 0 | 1 | 4 |
| Texas | 2 | 2 | 1 | 5 |
| Arizona | 2 | 1 | 0 | 3 |
| Northwestern | 2 | 1 | 0 | 3 |
| Auburn | 2 | 0 | 2 | 4 |
| Virginia | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| NC State | 1 | 2 | 0 | 3 |
| Iowa* | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Texas A&M | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Western Kentucky | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Indiana | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| UC-Santa Barbara | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
*In cases where athletes had transferred, we gave both schools credit for their medals. Dana Vollmer transferred from Florida to Cal, and Conor Dwyer went from Iowa to Florida. Amanda Weir went to USC and Georgia.
Water polo doesn’t count because the other states rarely play outside of a handful of club teams or colleges. Now Texas the cheaper housing state is a bit of a disappointment. It has good coaches and its cheaper to stay whether you live in a dorm or not.
Dr truth by my count Trojan swim club had 18 medalists overall. Easy on the granting of titles
Cal has a history of creating olympic champions so this is no surprise to me. Both coaches re great, but it helps that athletes want to go there too 🙂
Lets not forget that Trojan blood runs strong in Coach McKeever 😉 Fight On!
Truth be told. NBAC = 10 medals 7 Gold by my count. Love him or hate the simple fact is that Bowman is THE BEST COACH in the world.
I would be interested in seeing the Olympics scored out like a US championship meet, like NCAAs. Take the 9-16 semifinalists (or prelim swimmers in events over 200) scored from 9-1, like the consoles, then the finals the same as NCAA. You could even throw diving in, though I’m not sure how you would score synchro.
CollegeSwimming did score the meet: http://www.collegeswimming.com/news/2012/aug/5/scoring-olympics/
I mean score out the countries as if they were college teams.
Huh. My name switched then switched back. Whatever. I stand by what I said! It would be interesting to see what countries have the most depth without just a top three focus.
i actually scored it like that. this was just scored by top 8 finishers.
Men:
1. USA 474
2. AUS 218
3. JPN 197
4. GBR 146
5. FRA 144
6. CHN 140
7. RSA 135.5
8. GER 134.5
9. HUN 114
10. BRA 76
Women:
1. USA 460.5
2. AUS 278.5
3. CHN 228
3. GBR 228
5. JPN 143
6. DEN 130
7. NED 116
8. FRA 106
9. RUS 103
10. CAN 67
It would be very interesting to see the break down of each LSC where the swimmers did their age group swimming. I don’t feel that enough credit is given to the age group coaches or senior coaches (high school years) that laid the framework of their swimming careers!
A little bit of research shows that 25 of the 59 LSC had swimmers who competed as age groupers in their LSC’s.
4 CA Tyler Clary, Anthony Ervin, Jason Lezack, Jessica Hardy
4 PC Scott Weltz, Alyssa Anderson, Haley Anderson, Natalie Coughlin
3 GA Eric Shanteau, Kathleen Hersey, Amanda Weir (MN 10U)
3 IL Conor Dwyer, Matt Grevers, Tyler McGill
3 NC Ricky Berens, Charlie Houchin, Lauren Perdue
3 NJ Connor Jaeger, Cullen Jones, Rebecca Soni
3 PV Matt McLean, Katie Ledecky, Kate Ziegler
2 AZ Breeja Larson (18 only), Caitlin Leverenz
2 MA Andrew Gemmell, Brendan Hansen
2 MI Peter Vanderkaay, Allison Schmitt
2 NI Alex Meyer (AD 10U),… Read more »