The Bryant University men's and women's swimming teams have enjoyed incredible success under the leadership and guidance of head coach Katie Cameron since the program's inception four years ago.
And after tackling Bryant swimming's first challenge -- turning the upstart Bulldogs into a swimming power in the Northeast-10 Conference -- Cameron returns for her fourth year as the Bulldogs' head coach in 2008-09 ready to face with a new test -- competition in the Division I ranks.
But neither Division I nor Bryant's future home in the Northeast Conference are unfamiliar to Cameron, who came to Smithfield, R.I. from NEC member Wagner College where she served as head women's swim coach from 1997-2004.
In her eight seasons at Wagner, Cameron saw eight NEC individual champions and a conference-winning relay. She led her squad to a second-place conference finish in 2002 and 2003 and a third-place finish in 2005. But it was her 2003 Coach of the Year accolade that was the real testament to her accomplishments.
At Wagner, Cameron was also the first coach of the college's Division I swim program to handle all coaching and administrative duties, plus fundraising and budgeting. In addition to her duties with the women's swim team, Cameron served as the Wagner College Aquatics Director, overseeing all scheduling and staffing, and also coached the women's water polo team from 2001-03, serving as water polo administrator during the 2003-04 season.
In 2004, Bryant University announced the addition of women's intercollegiate swimming and the reinstatement of men's intercollegiate swimming as varsity programs, effective in the fall of 2005. The addition of the programs brought the total number of Bulldog varsity sports offered to 22.
Last season, Cameron coached her men's team to a 10-1 record, going 3-0 in conference, while leading her women's side to an undefeated 12-0 record. She also saw two swimmers, Tom Ferrigno and Jessica Looney, named Swimmer of the Meet at the 2008 New England Championships. Both teams finished fourth at the conference championships.
A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., Cameron is a 1996 graduate of Syracuse University's School of Management, earning her Masters in Education from Wagner in 2001.
