Augustana University has announced the addition of two sports beginning with the 2021-22 school year. Men's swimming & diving and the NCAA emerging sport of women's acrobatics and tumbling are set to bring the Viking athletics offerings to 21 sports.

In a year where team eliminations have been the norm, the announcement brings the number of new programs launching in 2021 to four. In addition to Augustana, Wagner College has launched a men’s team while Bluefield State University is set to add men’s and women’s programs.

"A key part of our strategic plan, Viking Bold: The Journey to 2030, is to provide new opportunities for students that also help fuel enrollment growth," Augustana University President Stephanie Herseth Sandlin said. "These two sport additions do just that, and we're excited about the student-athletes these programs will attract as we continue building momentum here at Augustana."

The men's swimming & diving team will be led by current women's team head coach Lindsie Micko. Now in her fifth year with Viking swimming & diving, Micko started the team from scratch after being hired in 2015. Since then, she has coached two student-athletes to three All-America honors, one NSIC Swimmer of the Year, three NSIC Freshmen of the Year along with 27 All-NSIC honorees.

"Men's swimming and diving will be a great complement to what Coach Micko has been building on the women's side," Augustana Director of Athletics Josh Morton said.

"We are excited to see Augustana launch a men’s team,” CSCAA Executive Director Greg Earhart said. “President Herseth and Director Morton have seen the positive impact Coach Micko and the women’s team have had, but they were really just scratching the surface.”

Earhart predicts the move will further strengthen the women’s team, athletic department and university as it moves towards Division I status. Research from the CSCAA has shown that in the past decade coed programs have won 92% of all conference titles. This is because, according to Earhart, the vast majority of club and high school teams are co-ed.

According to SwimCloud, which tracks college recruiting, two-thirds of female recruits indicated a preference for coed programs. This will, Earhart explains, gives the Vikings a leg up in recruiting while also creating a more competitive environment once those recruits begin enrolling.

Competitively, the CSCAA has found that the presence of a men’s team typically increases a women’s team’s conference finish by nearly ½ place in an 8-team field. This is calculated by taking the average Conference Finish from the 2017, 2018 and 2019 seasons, normalized across eight teams.

The benefit of having a coed team spills over to the national scene. Again, because swimmers and divers tend to prefer coed programs, a higher caliber of recruit tends to select coed college programs.

• Since 2011 only eleven single-gender women’s teams have finished in the top 25 at the NCAA Championships. Eight of those were UCLA which finished as high as 17th twice.

• Only Nine Teams in the 2019-20 Top 50 were single-gender (#21 Arkansas, #27 Houston, #31 UCLA, #36 Akron, #37 San Diego State, #39 Kansas, #46 Rice, #47 Washington State, #48 Nevada

• At the past three NCAA Championships, the average place for single-gender women’s teams is 34th place. The average place for coed women’s teams is 22.4th place (normalized for 48 teams).