Bill Snape Named Head Swimming Coach at McDaniel College

Courtesy: McDaniel Athletics

WESTMINSTER, Md. – Bill Snape, a four-time coach of the year who won three conference championships at Gallaudet University, was named the head swimming coach at McDaniel College on Aug. 7, 2023.

Snape served as the head coach of the men’s and women’s programs at Gallaudet for eight seasons from 2004-12. The women won the North Eastern Atlantic Conference (NEAC) championship in 2011 while the men won back-to-back titles in 2011 and 2012. The two teams also combined to set over 50 school records.

Snape was a two-time NEAC Men’s Swimming Coach of the Year in 2011 and 2012, NEAC Women’s Swimming Coach of the Year in 2011, and Capital Athletic Conference Men’s Swimming Coach of the Year in 2008. He mentored 24 first team all-conference selections, including four conference swimmer of the year recipients.

In 2012, the Bison men posted their first winning season since 1965 with a 5-4-1 record en route to their second consecutive NEAC championship. Snape received his second-straight coach of the year accolade while senior Brian Bennett was named the Swimmer of the Year for the second year in-a-row. Meanwhile, the women finished third and freshman Alexandra Polivanchuk was named NEAC Swimmer of the Year after Carlisle Robinson earned the honor in 2011.

In addition to his success at Gallaudet, Snape served two appointments as the head coach of United States Deaf Swimming (USDS). He oversaw the national teams at the 2007 United States Deaf World Championships in Taipei, Taiwan as well as the 2011 World Deaf Swimming Championships in Coimbra, Portugal.

Snape was named World Swim Coach of the Year by the International Committee of Sports for the Deaf as the U.S. upset Russia for the world championship in Portugal.

A former Division I swimmer at UCLA, Snape spent three years as the Associate Head Swim Coach for the George Washington University men’s team from 1986-89. He graduated magna cum laude from the Honors College at UCLA in 1986 with a bachelor’s degree in history before receiving his Juris Doctor degree from George Washington in 1989.

Since 2007, Snape has served as an Assistant Dean and Professor at American University’s Washington College of Law.

A resident of Westminster, Md. since 2020, Snape still advocates on behalf of deaf athletics, including a successful legal petition to the NCAA in 2017 that changed the swimming competition rules to accommodate both visual and audial starting cues.