Get To Know Towson University's Pat Mead

by Josh Huger (MrUtopia)

Towson University’s Pat Mead is this month’s Featured Coach. Coach Mead, who is in his 13th season at Towson, has enjoyed many successes while with the Tigers.

During his career at Towson, Coach Mead’s swimmers have won four straight Colonial Athletic Association Championships, competed at NCAA Championships, earned All-American honors, earned Towson University’s Athlete of the Year honors, have been awarded CAA Swimmer of the Year awards, and set many school records.

In this SwimUtopia interview Coach Mead tells us about what caused him to go into coaching and what his team is doing to stay focused going into this year’s NCAA Championships.

Let’s get started!

What team do you currently coach for?
Towson University

How many years have you been with the team?
I came to Towson in 1997 and the past 13 years have been extremely fulfilling.

What made you choose to take the coaching position?
It was a great opportunity to work at a University that was moving forward. I also felt there was an opportunity to build on a great tradition of swimming & diving.

Now that this year’s conference championships are over what do you do to keep everyone focused?
Well we are looking forward to taking the largest group of women to NCAA’s. In the past we have only taken one female so this year it should be easy to keep everyone motivated and focused. With the rest of the team we begin to set goals for the summer so that our training in the spring is productive and fun.

What is your favorite set to give your swimmers?
I would have to say that our “Golden Tiger” always brings a smile to everyone’s face. It is something I came up with which we use as a standard warm up. 

600 pull on 8 min. 
4 x 75 IM on 1:15
6 x 25 sprint on 30
200 kick on 3:20
50 skull

What other teams or schools did you coach at before coming to Towson University?
I My first coaching opportunity came from coaching a summer league team. That is where my passion for coaching originated. My first college coaching experience was at Springfield College in Mass. I was a G.A. working with John Taffe. At Springfield I quickly learned there is so much that goes into coaching beyond just the on deck duties. 

After two wonderful seasons at Springfield, I took on the challenge of starting the Drew University Swimming program. It was a brand new facility and I had a clean slate.  My four years at Drew were some of my foundest coaching experiences. At Drew I coached the college team, started a satellite age group program with Jim Wood at Berkeley Aquatic club and my wife and I ran our own learn to swim program. In the summers, I still coached summer league as well. 

After leaving Drew I headed back to University of Delaware as an Asst. Coach for one season. Having swum all four years at Delaware it was great to return and help coach their men’s team to another America East Championship. 

After Delaware I had the opportunity to take over Towson’s program. I saw great potential at Towson and thought I would come in for a few years and then move onward and upward.  13 years later I am still at it. In addition to coaching the college team, me and my wife run Tigerfish Aquatic Club which is everything from lessons to a masters team. In the summers, we still coach a local summer swim team as well.

What would you say your biggest accomplishment has been in coaching?
I am not really sure if I can pick any one particular accomplishment. The obvious answer would be to say winning championships, or taking people to NCAA’s or Olympic trials. Don’t get me wrong I am very proud of our winning seasons and the success we have had over the years. However, I believe in teaching the student athletes the value of hard work. 

So, I guess what gets me most excited is when I have an alumni contact me after they have graduated and they indicate that they made it through a tough time in their life because of things they learned here at Towson. That is what really gets me choked up and makes me proud to know we have helped them find happiness and success in their life.

Is there any particular moment that stands out in your mind from coaching?                  There are a few but one in particular centers around a swimmer we had not too long ago.  Her freshmen year we lost our conference championship by two points and on that last day on the last event we had Caroline Cox get disqualified in her 200 fly for having taken a underwater recovery at her touch on the last length of her race. 

The following two years our team struggled to get back to championship form but then her senior year we won with Caroline leading the way. She finalled in the 200 fly her senior year and I distinctly recall watching her on the podium holding Towson’s first Championship Trophy in over 30 years.  

A core value of our team is to never quit. She never quit or gave up on herself or the notion of winning. 

That was a very proud moment to see somebody stick things out and to have things come full circle her.

What motivates you as a coach?
Trying to be the best in everything we do. Winning is also high on my list. I am very competitive and maybe to a fault. I love competition. In our sport we don’t know what the limits of person really are. That is the fun part of coaching. We never really know when somebody has reached their potential. So each day is an opportunity for the coaches to motivate and challenge the swimmers to do their best. I thoughly enjoy watching that diamond in the rough develop into a star. I get just as excited for the kid winning the event as I do for the kid coming in last place but dropping huge amounts of time. I was fortunate to have coaches who always believed in me and helped me so helping the athletes see what they thought was impossible is very fulfilling.

What do you do to motivate your swimmers?
Scream and yell. Just kidding. But I am very vocal at practices and meets. Those who have seen me on a pool deck at a meet might think I am a big nuts. Its not show or anything I just really get excited watching our athletes swim fast.  When I swam I loved knowing my coach was excited for me and that gave me confidence so I guess I have carried that over into my coaching style. At a practice or a meet you can hear me from any point on the pool deck. Different athletes need different things to motivate them so I do try to figure out what buttons to push for each athlete. 

Do you have any personal routines before the start of a swim meet?
We do the normal things that most teams do. I do like to meet with the team 20 minutes prior to the start of the meet to recap what our goals are for the session. I guess another thing is I tend to be in a shirt and tie. Back when I swam I had a coach who said a swim meet is a special event and special events require proper dress attire. That always stuck with me and so very often I am in shirt and tie at meets. 

What caused you to go into coaching?
I went to University of Delaware with the intent of going to law school. My junior year, I coached a summer swim team that needed to win a single meet or they were in jeopardy of being thrown out of the league because they had been on a downward spiral for so many years. That summer we were able to turn things around dramatically and they got to stay in the league.

My senior year our college team taught swim lessons to the local community. I had a faculty member track me down in the locker room and tell me how great a job I did coaching his daughter. He indicated that I must be going in to education and I told him no, Law School.  He told me I was making a huge mistake and that I should reconsider. That moment got me thinking about what I really wanted to do with my life. Two months later I had accepted the teaching fellowing at Springfield College and the rest is history. Part of why I have always coached summer league wherever I have been is because that is where I learned the love of coaching.

What are some things that people may not know about you?
Not really much to tell. I am a pretty simple guy who just loves to coach. I love the game of golf but it is too expensive and takes up too much time out of the day. Two people I admire most are women. 

The first was my mother who taught lessons and swimming for over 25 years at Jersey Wahoos. 

The other is my wife. She is a mother of four, our diving coach at Towson and runs our age-group program. These two women are great role models for our women here at Towson.  Maureen shows our women that you can have a family and have a successful career as well.  

May sound crazy but if I didn’t coach I think I would become a carpenter. Being able to build things from scratch is always something I have wanted to do. Only problem is my wife is handier with the hammer than I am.

Please provide any additional information about yourself or your team that you might want us to include!
I grew up swimming for Jersey Wahoos in New Jersey. It was a six lane pool that was turned into a 7 lane pool by drilling holes into the walls. We had about 60 kids in the pool at once so you either kept up or got run over. Yet, back then we had some of the fastest swimmers in the country come out of Wahoos. My senior year the roof caved in and we swam outdoors in April and May because they had to wait till August to get the roof back up.

Our facility at Towson is an 8 lane pool. Nothing fancy, no bells, no whistles and yet we have four women going to NCAA’s and one who is ranked 2nd in the 500 free and 1650 free. My point is simple. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can do something. The fact is anything is possible if you are patient, hard working and committed to be the best.