Swimming & Diving
- Title:
- Assistant Coach
- Email:
- jessica.rodriguez@rice.edu
- Phone:
- (c) 713-295-0008
The 2021-22 season saw the Owls return from the Conference USA championship with their greatest collection of gold in school history. Six swimmers captured seven individual titles, setting school records for each and freshman Arielle Hayon was named the conference's top freshman.
Her influence is easy to see as Rice Swimming posted one of its best seasons in 2019-2020. Not only did Owls break a six-year old school record in the 100-freestyle, Rice swimmers won a total of five Conference USA titles on the way to a second place finish in the C-USA meet standings. For the first time in school history a Rice Swimmer, sophomore Marta Cano-Minarro, was named the C-USA co-Swimmer of the Year. In coordinating the daily training regimen with Head Coach Seth Huston, Rice swimmers won the C-USA Swimmer of the Week Award four times during the regular season but that’s not all. In September of 2019 Rice won the CSCAA Open Water National Championship over 15 participating teams. In March of 2020 the Owls were also off to a great start at the CSCAA National Invitational in Cleveland, Ohio, when the season came to an early and unexpected conclusion due to COVID-19.
In Rodriguez’ first full-time year in 2019, the Owls won eight C-USA event titles with a major re-write of the Rice record book that included seven new school marks. Rice channeled that success into the national level as senior Marie-Claire Schillinger competed in two events at the NCAA Championships. The Owls also won three events at the National Invitational in Cleveland, Ohio, on the way to finishing second overall among more than 30 scoring teams at the meet.
Where 2018-2019 is her first official year full-time as an assistant coach, Rodriguez also served an additional two years as a Rice volunteer coach. She was promoted by Coach Huston to the full time assistant coach in June 2018.
A USA certified coach through Rice Aquatics, Rodriguez has been the lead coach for that program's beginning and intermediate teen groups. The Stafford, Texas, native was a four-year swimming letterwinner at the University of North Texas who served one year as a volunteer assistant coach for the Mean Green. Rodriguez works with all areas of the Owls' swim program and has a primary focus on training sessions, video, team travel and recruiting.
"She has proven herself to be a valuable member of our coaching staff this whole time and she continues to grow in her role,” said coach Huston. “The team knows Jessica has a passion for swimming, for them as people and for Rice University."
Rodriguez' experience as a club, high school, and college swimmer has allowed her to draw on a wide-array of coaching techniques. The former middle-distance freestyle specialist certainly understands the demands of being a student-athlete, having been a three-time Academic all-conference honoree in her competitive years who has recently been pursuing a Masters of Education.
"That's Jessica `building the whole person' as we say at Rice," coach Huston added. "At our University, athletic department and within our swimming program, we strive to develop an individual to be a committed student, athlete and teammate, as well as a contributor to the whole community. Jessica can and will lead by her values and actions."
