Matt Leach - Swimming and Diving Coach - Iowa State University Athletics

Matt Leach

Title:
Head Swimming Coach
Email:
leach@iastate.edu

Matt Leach is in his second season as the head coach of the Iowa State swimming and diving program. He was named the fifth head coach of the program on May 1, 2024.

Leach's first season at Iowa State in 2024-25 was a rebuilding season, finishing with a 3-5 dual meet record. The Cyclones opened the season with dominating wins over South Dakota State (201-94) and South Dakota (179-119) in mid-October before picking up a dual win at UNI in January. Under Leach's mentorship, freshman Grace Swoboda had a stellar rookie season, breaking the freshman 100 breast record with a time of 1:01.02 at the Big 12 Championships and becoming the second-fastest performer in ISU history.

Four of Leach's Iowa State student-athletes have earned College Sports Communicators (CSC) Academic All-District honors. The 2024-25 squad also earned CSCAA Scholar All-America honors in the fall, boasting a 3.69 team GPA with nine student-athletes posting a perfect 4.0 semester GPA.

Leach inherited a Washington State program that hadn't produced an NCAA Championship qualifier in nearly a decade prior to his arrival in Pullman and promptly turned it into one that produced an NCAA qualifier every year (excluding the 2020 season when the NCAA Championships were canceled due to COVID) during his six-year tenure in Pullman, including the Cougars' first NCAA Championship scorer in some 17 seasons in 2024. WSU finished tied for 40^th at the 2024 NCAA Championships and scored points for only the sixth time in program history.

Washington State produced one of the most impressive performances in the program history at the 2024 Pac-12 Conference Championships. The Cougars recorded 21 WSU Top 10 times, including six school records and a pair of medals, while as a team, WSU totaled 498.5 points to register the program's second-highest point total since 1987 (Pac-10/12 era).

All-told, Leach's WSU program saw five NCAA Championship qualifiers, its first-ever PAC-12 Conference individual champion and 60 Pac-12 Winter Academic Honor Roll members.

Before taking over as Washington State's head coach, Leach spent three seasons at Indiana State, where he started the Sycamore women's program from scratch in 2015 and hit the water the following year. In the program's second competitive season, he was honored as the 2017-18 Missouri Valley Conference Coach of the Year after guiding ISU to a 13-win campaign that featured a 10-dual match win streak and a record-setting team performance at the Missouri Valley Conference Championships where it set school records in every event, highlighted by the program's first individual conference champion. Nine Sycamores earned All-MVC honors, including a trio of first-team selections.

Leach went to Indiana State after spending six seasons at the University of Wyoming (2009-15), including the last four as the program's associate head coach, and worked extensively with sprint swimmers. His group helped rewrite the Cowgirl record books, as every spring event school record was broken during his time at the Laramie institution. He also coached sprint swimmers to NCAA and Olympic trials competitions at Wyoming, including two-time All-America selection Kelsey Conci who earned trips to the NCAA Championships in the 100 backstroke and the 50 and 100 freestyle, placing 10th in the 100 backstroke at the 2011 NCAA Championships and ninth at the 2012 championships.

He began his coaching career as a graduate assistant coach at Louisiana State in 2004, and then spent two seasons (2007-09) as a volunteer assistant coach on the Tigers' staff. Leach coached several athletes to the NCAA Championships, and a Top 25 ranking for the men's and women's teams. He also served as the head age group coach at Tiger Aquatics from 2006-09 and was named the 2007 Louisiana State Age Group Coach of the Year for his efforts in his rookie season.

The Portland, Ore., native swam collegiately at Indiana University (2000-04), where he was a four-time All-American. He helped the Hoosiers to a Big Ten Conference title in the 200-medley relay as a senior and still holds school records as a member of the 200-freestyle relay and 400- medley relay. Leach also competed at the 2000 and 2004 U.S. Olympic Trials.

He graduated from Indiana in December 2004 with a bachelor's degree in environmental management and received his master's degree, also in environmental planning and management, from LSU in May 2007. Leach and his wife, Katie, who hails from Springfield, Ill., have one daughter, Eloise, and one son, Arlo.

Matt Leach Year-by-Year

Year	School	Record	Conference/Finish	NCAA Individual Qualifiers
2016-17	Indiana State	3-6 (.333)	0-0/7th	-
2017-18	Indiana State	13-6 (.684)	0-0/4th	-
Totals at Indiana State	Two Seasons	16-12 (.571)	0-0 (.000)
2018-19	Washington State	4-7 (.364)	1-5/8th	1
2019-20	Washington State	3-7 (.300)	0-5/8th	*Canceled
2020-21	Washington State	4-1 (.800)	0-1/7th	1
2021-22	Washington State	4-3 (.571)	1-3/8th	1
2022-23	Washington State	2-6 (.250)	0-5/8th	2
2023-24	Washington State	2-4 (.333)	1-4/8th	2
Totals at Washington State	Six Seasons	19-28 (.404)	3-23 (.115)	7
2024-25	Iowa State	3-5 (.375)	0-2/10th	-
Totals at Iowa State	One Season	3-5 (.375)	0-2 (.000)
Career Totals	Nine Seasons	38-45 (.458)	3-25 (.107)