The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Men's Swimming cleans up at second annual Golden Goggle Awards
11.15.2005 | Men's Swimming and Diving
Olympic triple gold medalist Aaron Peirsol was named Male Athlete of the Year, complementing his USA Swimming Athlete of the Year honor at the annual U.S. Aquatic Sports Convention in September. Peirsol had an outstanding post-Olympic year, winning three World Championship gold medals and setting two world records throughout the year, in the 100m back stroke in April and the 200m back in July.
"This is very, very humbling. I don't know if you guys can understand," said Peirsol. "I mean, there's a guy who nearly broke 50 seconds in the 100 butterfly this year. That doesn't happy very often even in freestyle. He's actually faster than me in freestyle. So I'm very humbled. Congratulations Brendan. Congratulations Ian. Congratulations Eddie. This is certainly a wonderful event."
University of Texas head coach Reese earned the Coach of the Year Award for the second-straight year. The longtime coach at UT had seven athletes make the World Championships team, accounting for five individual gold medals and one individual silver medal.
"Thank you very much for this award. But even more than that, I want to thank the sponsors of this ceremony tonight and the purpose of this ceremony, to honor the swimmers and those who have helped the swimmers," said Reese. "This is a great thing that is occurring, and we need to keep it going I've got a great assistant coach named Kris Kubik who keeps me from killing myself on deck. And then I've got a great group of swimmers who trust me, the greatest honor I can receive."
Olympic medalist Ian Crocker won the Male Performance of the Year for his gold-medal winning performance in the 100m butterfly at the World Championships. Crocker lowered his own world record by almost four-tenths and defeated the field by a wide margin of 1.25 seconds.
Olympic medalist Brendan Hansen won the Perseverance Award, given to the athlete who came back from adversity to have outstanding performances in 2005. Hansen, who won individual silver and bronze medals at the 2004 Olympics, won two individual gold medals in the 100m and 200m breaststroke at the 2005 World Championships, beating rival Kosuke Kitajima of Japan in the 100.
Approximately 625guestsattended the gala at the Hammerstein Ballroom. The Broadway-themed event was sold out for the second consecutive year. A portion of the proceeds from the 2005 Golden Goggles will go to help families displaced byHurricane Katrina.
The list of 2005 award winners includes:
Male Athlete of the Year: Aaron Peirsol
Female Athlete of the Year: Katie Hoff
Coach of the Year: Eddie Reese
Breakout Performer of the Year: Jessica Hardy
Perseverance Award:Brendan Hansen
Male Performance of the Year:100m Butterfly (Ian Crocker)
Female Performance of the Year: (all from 2005 World Championships)
1500m Freestyle (Kate Ziegler)
Relay Performance of the Year: (all from 2005 World Championships)
Women's 4 x 200 Free Relay: Natalie Coughlin, Katie Hoff, Whitney Myers and Kaitlin Sandeno
