Dan Sivak is set to enter his fourth season as an assistant coach under Ashley Dell for the 2025-26 season.
The Flames maintained high level of competition in between the lane lines during the 2025-26 season, as Sivak contributed to the Flames finishing in fourth-place with the men's team and a program-high fifth place for the women's team since joining the Missouri Valley Conference in the 2022-23 season.
Working alongside Dell, Sivak helped lead the Flames to a combined 39 top eight finishes, 14 finishes in the top three and 17 records broken. Dell also helped coached the first three Missouri Valley Conference champions in Molly Kroeger (500 freestyle), James McCarthy (200 breast) and Samantha Wilson (200 fly).
The program had 14 student-athletes qualify for the College Swimming and Diving Coaches Association (CSCAA) National Invitational Championships to end the season, the most in school history. The men's team finished in eighth place at the event, which was a 15-place and 264.5 point improvement from a season ago.
Things didn’t let up for UIC Swimming and Diving under the contributions of Sivak in his second season apart of the staff, as the men’s program placed fourth (532 points) in the highest (and final) finish in the Mid-American Conference championship meet in March 2024. The women’s team finished seventh in its second season in the Missouri Valley Conference.
Sivak helped lead the program to a 37 top eight finishes, 17 top three finishes, 11 new school records and 117 lifetime bests during the 2023-24 season.
Sivak holds or shares four program records: the 100 and 200 back, the 200 IM, and the 200 medley relay. He was a nine-time individual finalist at the Horizon League Championships, including two second-place finishes. He was named UIC's Most Valuable Swimmer as a junior, when he began a two-year stretch of dual meet domination. Over his final two years, he finished lower than third only twice in his primary events.
Sivak was named to the Horizon League All-Academic Team three times. Since his graduation in 2020, he has stayed close to the program, often volunteering at home meets and informally mentoring members of the team.
