UVA Associate Head Coach Blaire Bachman To Be Director of Swimming and Diving At Texas A&M

After announcing it would combine its men’s and women’s programs under a “Director of Swimming & Diving” a month ago, Texas A&M has named Blaire Bachman as its Director of Swimming & Diving.

Bachman has been with Virginia since 2017 and was an assistant coach with the program for four years before being promoted to associate head coach in 2021 . While at Virginia, Bachman worked primarily with the upper mid-distance groups and directly coached Paige Madden. She also has served as the women’s recruiting coordinator and most recently brought in SwimSwam’s #3 ranked recruiting class.

Last summer, Bachman served as an assistant coach for the USA Swimming staff at the 2023 World Championships.

Prior to arriving at Virginia, Bachman spent a season as an assistant coach with Indiana where she was the women’s recruiting coordinator. Before Indiana, she spent a season with Dartmouth where she also was the women’s recruiting coordinator.

Bachman already has head coaching experience as she spent five years with NAIA’s Brenau University. While at Brenau, she was named the 2014 NAIA Swimming and Diving Women’s Coach of the Year.

She graduated from Georgia College and State University in 2009 with a degree in mass communication, with a concentration in Public Relations.

As previously mentioned, the men’s and women’s programs at Texas A&M will undergo a change as they will be combined under Bachman as Director of Swimming and Diving. Previously, the teams had separate coaching staffs with Steve Bultman leading the women’s program and Jay Holmes leading the men’s programs. Bultman announced his retirement set for the end of this past season in January.

This past season, the women’s program finished 3rd out of 12 teams at the 2024 SEC Championships and went on to finish 14th at NCAAs. That was their highest finish on the women’s side since 2019.  The men’s program was 4th out of 10 teams at SECs and 16th at NCAAs.