SEC championship brings deserved recognition to Lars Jorgensen

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Jars Lorgensen (by the SEC sign) celebrates with his team after winning the SEC championship. (SEC Photo)

Kentucky has had a lot of coaches that were hired by athletics director Mitch Barnhart do amazing jobs and many are not in the high profile sports. Volleyball coach Craig Skinner and softball coach Rachel Lawson have produced consistent winning programs and NCAA Tournament qualifiers. That’s just two of the coaches who have taken programs to all-time highs at Kentucky.

Now add swim coach Lars Jorgensen to that list. He’s in his eighth year as UK swim and dive coach and has helped the program make significant improvement. Danielle Galyer became the FIRST UK swimming national champion in 2016. Asia Seidt earned 21 All-America honors and was named 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year.

Last weekend the UK women’s team won Kentucky’s first SEC championship. Think about the significance of that for UK to beat traditional powers Florida, Tennessee and others.

“Kentucky obviously has not been seen before as a swimming school,” said junior Riley Gaines, who won an individual SEC title and also was on a winning relay team.

“Look at his era here. See the progression from the bottom of the barrel team to now winning. It has just been incredible. He’s amazing at developing swimmers. He does not get the top recruits in terms of raw talent but recruits he gets all get better. He develops swimmers like no one else in the conference can.”

Jorgensen has built Kentucky into an annual top 25 program and has been a five-time USA Swiming National Team Coach, a USA Team World University Games coach and 2017 UK Athletics Coach of the Year.

But none of that got him the recognition winning the SEC championship did.

“We were all so happy to get this (championship) for him and give him the recognition he deserves,” Gaines said. “We might not be the best team physically but he’s the best at developing talent and getting the most out of you. There’s nobody else like him.”

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