Whitney Hite Named Cal Women’s Swimming Assistant Coach
BERKELEY, May 28. DENVER native Whitney L. Hite has been named the new assistant coach for the University of California’s women’s swimming program, Cal head coach Teri McKeever announced today.
Hite comes to Berkeley after serving as an assistant coach with the University of Georgia’s swimming staff for the past five years. With the Bulldogs, he helped Georgia’s women’s team to three straight national championships, 1999-2001. In 2002 and 2003, the Georgia women posted consecutive runner-up finishes.
Hite also helped coach Georgia’s men’s swimming team, a squad that posted Top 15 national finishes in each season during his tenure.
While Hite was an assistant at Georgia, the Bulldogs’ dominated the Southeastern Conference. This past season, Georgia swimmers Robert Margalis and Mary DeScenza were named SEC Swimmer and SEC Freshman of the Year, respectively. Hite also helped coach one the greatest swimmers in Georgia’s history in sprint freestyler Maritza Correia. With 11 national titles (five individual and six relays) to her credit, Correia holds more NCAA hardware than any other swimmer in Lady Bulldog history.
A four-year member of the men’s swimming team at the University of Texas, Hite swam sprint freestyle for the Longhorns and graduated with a B.S. in sports management from Texas in the spring of 1997. He earned his master’s degree in education from Georgia in 2001.
“From a candidate pool of over 60 qualified swimming coaches to choose from, Whitney’s solid experience and great enthusiasm stood out above all others,” said McKeever, who has led Cal to Top 10 national finishes in each of the last seven seasons. “We are happy to welcome him to Cal, and I know that his former successes will translate well in helping our program to continue to improve.”
Former Cal assistant coach Adam Crossen has accepted a position as an assistant coach with the Irvine Novaquatics national club team.