Pac-12's BestPac-12's Best
Women's Swimming & Diving

Pac-12's Best

STANFORD, Calif. - Stanford junior Ella Eastin was named the Pac-12 Swimmer of the Year, freshman Brooke Forde was voted the Pac-12 Newcomer of the Year and Greg Meehan won the league's Swimming Coach of the Year award, as announced by the conference office on Thursday.

Eastin is the first two-time Pac-12 Swimmer of the Year since Arizona's Lacey Nymeyer (2007-08) and just the fifth overall, joining Summer Sanders (Stanford, 1991 and 1992), Kristine Quance (USC, 1994, 1995-96) and Natalie Coughlin (2001-03).

Meehan is the third coach to win the conference's top honor three years in a row, joining Teri McKeever (2011-13) and Frank Busch (2004-08).

This is the second straight year Stanford swept the Pac-12 yearly awards, as voted on by the conference coaches. Eastin, who was the Pac-12 Newcomer and Swimmer of the Year in 2016, was named the Swimmer of the Meet at the NCAA Championships last week. She was the only athlete to win three individual national titles, set American records in both individual medleys and also won two relay titles. 

This is the third straight year Stanford has produced the league's top swimmer.


Forde earned three All-America honors at the NCAA Championships, including a national title as a member of the 800 free relay. She was 11th overall in the 500-yard freestyle and was fourth in the nation in the 400 individual medley -- the fourth woman in school history to break four minutes in the event (3:59.34). Forde also finished on the podium in all four of her events at the Pac-12 Championships.  

Stanford has won this award for the fourth straight year as Forde joins the likes of Simone Manuel (2015), Eastin (2016) and Ledecky (2017). In all, Forde is the seventh Cardinal to be named Pac-12 Newcomer of the Year. 


Meehan, who was also the NCAA Coach of the Year, led the Cardinal to its second straight Pac-12 and national championships. Stanford had 16 different All-Americans combine for 51 All-America honors, five American records, eight individual national championships and five relay titles. Stanford's 220-point victory at the NCAA meet was the third-largest in history, and largest since 1993.

Meehan has won the Pac-12 Coach of the Year honor in four of his six seasons at the helm of the Cardinal. Former Cardinal coach Richard Quick won this award four times, while Lea Maurer (2010) and George Haines (1987) also took home Pac-12 Coach of the Year honors while leading the Cardinal.


Stanford became the first school to reach 10 NCAA swimming and diving titles and claimed back-to-back championships for the first time since 1992-96. In a record-setting meet last weekend, the Cardinal became just the third school to sweep all five relays at the NCAA meet, and tied an all-time record with 13 event titles overall, last set 25 years ago by Stanford. A full recap is here.


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