Sid Cassidy Named 2025 Benjamin Franklin Award Winner by CSCAA
Sid Cassidy, a long-serving official and advocate for open water swimming, was named the 2025 recipient of the Benjamin Franklin Award by the College Swimming Coaches Association of America on Thursday.
Cassidy has spent the last 20 years at Saint Andrew’s School in Florida, currently serving as its aquatics director and head coach. He has been influential in the international spread of open water swimming, advocating for its inclusion at the Olympics starting at the 2008 Beijing Games, and served as the director of that meet. He’s been part of the operation of a number of major international meets since, including the Paris Olympics.
Cassidy began serving as a coach and administrator for open water swimming with USA Swimming in 1982. He joined FINA’s technical committee for the open water discipline in 1996, becoming chairman in 2006. He held that position for World Aquatics at the 2024 Paris Olympics. In four decades of work, he has served as a national team coach for the U.S., a USA Swimming Administrator, a Swimming Safety Task Force member and been an Olympic official (including a starter for the marathon swim), race announcer and race director.
Cassidy swam at NC State, an All-American and eight-time ACC individual champion. He pursued marathon swimming professionally, swimming and coaching athletes who achieved a number of feats, including a relay double crossing of the English Channel in 1991 that broke the speed record.
He coached in college, at James Madison and the University of Miami. In the high school realm, he’s been recognized as the Florida High School Coach of the Year on five occasions. He also co-owns Saint Andrew’s Aquatics and the Florida Swim School, mentoring swimmers in the pool and in open water competition. His many accolades include enshrinement in the ISCA Hall of Fame in 2024 and winning the Irving Davids/Captain Roger W. Wheeler Memorial Award from the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 2020, as well as the organization’s Paragon Award in 2014.
The Benjamin Franklin Award recognizes “pioneering individuals or organizations whose efforts and innovations best promote the integrity and enhancement of the student-athlete ideal.” Previous winners can be found here. It will be given at CSCAA’s Annual Meetings and Awards Celebration in Raleigh, N.C., May 4-6.