West Virginia Hires Matt O’Neill as Head Diving Coach
West Virginia has hired Matt O’Neill as the head diving coach, returning to his alma mater, the school announced this week.
O’Neill has spent the last six years at Harvard, powering the Crimson to 15 NCAA qualifiers and three All-Americans. Harvard has won four Ivy League men’s championship and one women’s Ivy League title, with five Ivy diving champions and 57 top-eight finishers.
“I am deeply grateful to (Vice President and Director of Athletics) Wren Baker and head coach Brent MacDonald for giving me this incredible opportunity to return to WVU and help lead this program into the future,” O’Neill said in a university statement. “As a career coach and lifelong Mountaineer, there is nothing more exciting than giving back to the program that shaped who I am today. I am eager to work with our student-athletes and staff in this world-class facility to continue building this program’s legacy.”
O’Neill was previously the head coach at Case Western Reserve from 2015-19. While in Cleveland, he was the head coach of American Flyers Diving, which finished fifth at the 2018 USA Diving Junior National Championships.
O’Neill dove at West Virginia from 2008-12. Voted the program’s most valuable diver in his junior season, he finished as the runner-up at the Big East Championships in 3-meter as a senior in 2012. He set the program record on 3-meter as a freshman and also held the 1-meter school mark. He finaled on both springboards at Big Easts in 2011. O’Neill graduated with a bachelor’s degree in athletic coaching education.
“It was clear from the beginning of this search that the best person to lead our diving program and provide it the stability it deserves was going to be Matt O’Neill,” head coach Brent MacDonald said. “He is not only a coach with proven success but a true Mountaineer. With the tools we can provide at WVU, Matt is going to have our diving program at an elite level very soon.”
