Former Cal Swim Coach Teri McKeever Admits to Abuse, Receives Suspension

The U.S. Center for Safe Sport's three-month ban is insufficient, said one former Cal swimmer.

Former Cal women’s swim coach Teri McKeever for the first time admitted abusing her former athletes, who expressed their disappointment over what they consider inadequate punishment from the U.S. Center for Safe Sport.

McKeever agreed to a three-month suspension from participating in any events sanctioned by the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee. She also was given 12 months’ probation and agreed to not have any contact with her former Cal athletes.

“To think that that’s all they’re going to give her is a slap in the face,” Cindy Tran, a six-time NCAA champion during her time at Cal, told Scott Reid of the Orange County Register. “It’s just strange to think that a year from now she can be back on a (pool) deck coaching and who knows with what intention. It just seems like they wanted to be done with it.

“She can be back in a year after 20 plus years, 30 years of her coaching and behaving the way she has.”

McKeever, perhaps the most successful swim coach in women's collegiate history and the only female head coach of the U.S. Olympic team, was fired by Cal last January following an eight-month independent investigation commissioned by the school into her treatment of Golden Bears’ swimmers.

That inquiry concluded that McKeever discriminated against swimmers on the basis of race, national origin and disability, including using the n-word, and abused athletes in violation of university policy.

Safe Center’s 18-month investigation led to McKeever admitting that “between 2000 and 2022 (she) engaged in behavior that constitutes Emotional Misconduct while acting in the role of Head Coach of the women’s swimming team at the University of California, Berkeley. (McKeever) screamed profanities close to Athletes’ faces, encouraged Athletes to train through injuries, grabbed an Athlete by the arm, screamed and ridiculed Athletes during practice, humiliated Athletes in the presence of the team, and caused Athletes severe emotional distress.”

That wasn’t enough for Tran, according to the Orange County Register.

“I didn’t see anything explicitly where she says, ‘I own up to my mistakes and I was wrong,’” Tran said. “So it didn’t really feel like anything.”

Reporting by the Southern California New Group publication, affiliated with the Bay Area News Group, included interviews with more than 40 current or former Cal swimmers, along with parents, former coaches and a former administrator.

Here’s a summary of what the newspaper learned:

McKeever routinely bullied swimmers, often in deeply personal terms, or used embarrassing or traumatic experiences from their past against them, used racial epithets, body-shamed and pressured athletes to compete or train while injured. Swimmers and parents have also alleged that McKeever revealed medical information about athletes to other team members and coaches without their permission in violation of federal, state and university privacy laws and guidelines.

Nine Cal women’s swimmers, six since 2018, have told SCNG they made plans to kill themselves or obsessed about suicide for weeks or months because of what they describe as McKeever’s bullying.

That reporting prompted the investigation by Safe Sport, in which 19 athletes described more than 90 incidents of abuse between 2000 and 2022, the newspaper said.

One of the violations McKeever admitted to was a February 2022 incident in which she said she grabbed a swimmer, identified by McKeever’s attorney as Emily Gantriis, an NCAA champion, “by the arm in anger and unintentionally scratched (the swimmer’s) skin with (her) fingernails above (the swimmer’s) elbow while screaming close to (the swimmer’s face).”

Gantriis, a European Championships medalist for Denmark, told SCNG in 2022 that McKeever screamed at her “almost daily.”

“‘You’re useless, you’re a piece of (expletive), you’re a piece (expletive),” Gantriis recalled. “And she would get really close to you when she screamed. Right in your face. So close. You could feel her spit in your mouth really. She was really aggressive, really intimidating. You were really scared at that moment.”

McKeever would get physical at times, Gantriis said.

“She would grab me and tug really hard on my arm and scratch her nails into me,” Gantriis said.

Cover photo of former Cal swim coach Teri McKeever by Kyle Terada, USA Today

Follow Jeff Faraudo of Cal Sports Report on Twitter: @jefffaraudo