Houston Cougar Aquatic Sports
 
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Coaching Staff

  

Meet the Coaches!

All of the coaches at Houston Cougar Aquatic Sports are experiences, knowledgeable, fully certified, and meet the standards set forth by USA Swimming. For more information on our staff, please feel free to read the biographies below.
 
 

Mark Taylor - Executive Director

 

 
 
Mark is the Head Coach of the University of Houston's Women's Swimming and Diving Team and is currently in his seventh season at the University. Since taking over as the Head Coach Mark has continued to lead the team to success and strives to excel. In the 2008/2009 season, The University of Houston's Women's Swimming and Diving team placed second overall at the Conference USA Swimming and Diving Championships.

Mark has also coached several different National Teams for different countries around the World and has coached several athletes at World Championships and the Olympic Games.

He has seen a tremendous amount of success throughout his career not only as a coach, but also as an athlete. During his competitive swimming career Mark was ranked as one of the nations fastest swimmers.
 

 

Greg Orphanides - Head Coach

 
 
 

Greg has been involved in swimming for over 20 years, and throughout that time has been successful both in and out of the pool.

As a swimmer, Greg always strove for his goals and pursued excellence. At the height of his career Greg represented Great Britain for 10 years at various national and international competitions including the World and European Championships.

As a coach, he has seen even more success progressing several athletes to National Standards. He is a great role model and an inspiration to our COOGS swimmers.


 
 

Amanda Rutter - Head Age Group Coach

 

 
 
Hailing from Canada, Amanda has been involved in swimming for 14 years with 8 years of coaching experience. She started her swimming career in summer league at a young age, progressing to year-round swimming. In 2003 she received an academic scholarship to the University of Houston and competed as a sprint freestyle and butterfly swimmer for two years.

Now she is enjoying coaching for the COOGS and is striving to obtain her Master's Degree in Early Childhood Education.