Merced High School honored late longtime aquatics coach Jon Dibblee on Wednesday afternoon with a rededication ceremony for the new pool that opened last spring. A large sign that read “Dibblee’s Deck” hung underneath the video scoreboard. The ceremony was held prior to the Bears water polo games against Los Banos and was attended by Dibblee’s family, school administrators, former and current coaches, MUHSD leaders and Merced County Supervisor Josh Pedrozo.

 

The ceremony comes a couple weeks after Atwater High held a ceremony rededicating their new pool in honor of former longtime coach Roddy Svendsen. “I really love the decision to name these two new aquatic facilities after two legendary, hall of fame, and foundational coaches for the sport of water polo in our area: Roddy Svendsen on the men side at the Atwater facility and our own Jon Dibblee on the women’s side for the Merced facility,” said former longtime Merced boys aquatic coach Stephen Eccles. 

 

Dibblee coached the girls water polo and swimming teams at Merced High for 30 years, including 24 as the head coach. He coached the Bears girls water polo teams to 10 Central California Conference championships. Many of his former players went on to play in college, including Margie Dingeldein, who also played with Team USA and won a bronze medal in the 2004 Olympics in Athens. From 1988-96, the Bears won seven league championships and reached the Sac-Joaquin Section championship game in 1996 where they lost to Johansen 4-3.

 

Eccles coached the boys water polo and swimming programs at Merced High alongside Dibblee for 15 years. He said it was great to come in and work with an established coach, who could show him the ropes after Eccles spent 11 years prior coaching junior college water polo. “What was so wonderful is that his philosophy and my philosophy worked hand in hand, and so it was such a smooth and seamless transition,” said Eccles, who addressed the crowd during the ceremony with Dibblee’s wife Cindie and son Alex by his side. “It was very natural right off the bat.”

 

Dibblee also coached the Junior National Women’s Water Polo team with former Johanen coach Brent Bohlender. Together they traveled across the country and to places like Cuba and Europe. Bohlender described their approach as the “good cop, bad cop routine” when dealing with players. Dibblee played the role of good cop. “He just had the right disposition for that position,” said Bohlender to the Merced Sun-Star shortly after Dibblee’s death in 2017. “He was an excellent person to travel and coach with.”

 

Eccles credits Dibblee and Bohlender for growing the sport of girls water polo from its infancy to what it is today. The Bears are the defending Sac-Joaquin Section Division II champions under

current coach Kit Grattan. Merced is off to an 18-1 start this season and are currently 6-0 in the CCC. For the first time this year Merced will be able to host section playoff games on campus in its new pool. “Since we started having home playoff games we’ve had to host games at other facilities,” Grattan said. “So I'm super excited that we’ll be able to host section playoff games at our own pool.”

 

The new aquatic center is one of the athletic facility improvements to come to Merced High in recent years. The new gymnasium and Cathie Hostetler Stadium have been big additions to the Bears athletic program. “Our schools and our students, our staff, deserve the facilities that I think the high school district is now providing,” said MUHSD board member Erin Hamm. “And it's just been an honor to serve on the board, and it is about time that we have a pool like this for our section champion girls and hopefully our section champion boys.”

Shawn Jansen is the MUHSD Program Manager Digital Media. He can be reached at Sjansen@muhsd.org.