Legendary Miami Diving Coach Randy Ableman Retires After 35 Years
Legendary diving coach Randy Ableman announced his retirement on Monday after 35 years at the University of Miami.
Ableman arrived in Coral Gables in 1989. He’s coached 14 divers to 26 national championships. A nine-time CSCAA Coach of the Year, he mentored 160 All-America performances. Ableman was named the ACC Diving Coach of the Year 10 times – six for the men’s, four women’s. He was also a seven-time Big East Conference diving coach of the year from 2000-03 (four women’s, three men’s). He won USA Diving’s Phil Boggs Award in 2002.
“I am very proud of the great student-athletes who have come through our diving program and everything we have accomplished,” Ableman said in a university statement. “These kids came to Miami with a dream, and I just worked to make sure for all these years that they got there. Thank you to everyone at the University of Miami who has supported our program. I will forever remain a Miami Hurricane.”
Ableman has tutored 17 Olympians. He served on Team USA’s staff at the 1996, 2000, 2004, 2012 and 2016 Olympics and was an assistant for South Africa at the 2008 Games.
Ableman began his coaching career in 1984 at Wright State. He spent four seasons at South Carolina before arriving in Miami.
He dove at the University of Iowa, an Olympian in 1980 for the team that missed out on the Moscow Games due to the American boycott. He won the NCAA tile on 1-meter in 1981. (His wife, Karen Gorham, was a U.S. champion in 1980 who dove at the University of Arkansas.) He was inducted to the University of Iowa Athletics Hall of Fame in 2006 and the University of Miami Sports Hall of Fame in 2007.
“Randy Ableman is one of the most decorated head coaches in the storied history of Miami Athletics,” Vice President/Director of Athletics Dan Radakovich said. “He put Hurricanes diving on the map – not just nationally but internationally – and served as a coach and mentor to hundreds of divers who represented this university in a first-class manner. I want to thank Randy for his dedication to our program and I wish him and his wife, Karen, all the best as they begin their next journey in life.”
