Tom House finds success as a two-sport athlete

By Chuck Walsh
Seminoles.com

Tom House is almost certainly the only student-athlete in the history of Florida State University to be offered scholarships in the sports of basketball and swimming.

As a prep basketball star, he led Centerville High School to a state championship as a junior in 2022 and to a runner-up finish as a senior in 2021. He helped lead Centerville to a 29-1 record and an undefeated 14-0 conference record as a senior. House made 222 career 3-point shots and shot nearly 40 percent from the 3-point line during his career.

As a prep swimming star, he was invited to train at the Olympic Training Facility with the United States national team coaches. His main events were the 400 individual medley, the 200 individual medley, the 200 breaststroke and the 400 freestyle. House was ranked in the top-10 nationally when he was 15 and was invited to the National Select Camp in 2019. His name was being mentioned as a future Olympian.

Tom was on just about every recruiting list as a basketball player and narrowed his choices to Florida State, Georgia, Boston College, Furman, and Ohio.

He received scholarship offers as a swimmer from the Who’s Who of the college swimming world that included Florida State, Tennessee, Ohio State, Michigan, Arizona State, and Texas.

As Tom and his Seminole basketball teammates were preparing recently to play their final non-conference game of the regular season game against Lipscomb, he quickly recalls why he chose the hardwood over the pool.

“Basketball and swimming are completely different sports,” Tom began. “Swimming is almost 100 percent an individual sport. I chose to play basketball because I love the work aspect of basketball and only liked the competitive aspect of swimming. That work that you have to put in as a basketball player made it easier for me for get up early and workout every morning as a compared to practice in the pool.”

He is also quick to admit that swimming practice where he swam upwards of 8,000 yards at each day is much harder than basketball practice.

In May 2020 at the end of his sophomore year in high school, House chose to dedicate himself to becoming the best player he could be and began chasing basketball scholarships as he became one of the top 3-point shooters in the history of high school basketball in the state of Ohio.

“I would say that swimming probably hurt my development as a basketball player because I was a distance swimmer and my body wasn’t used to the explosive movements I needed to perfect as basketball player,” said House. “I had to rework all of my muscles and my muscle memory when I decided that basketball was the sport I wanted to dedicate my athletic career to.”

House didn’t have to look far for instruction on the basketball court.

His father, Jeff, coached women’s basketball in an assistant coach’s role for 27 years at UMass Lowell, Jacksonville, Rutgers, Kentucky, and Dayton and in the WNBA with the New York Liberty and the Washington Mystics. His mom, Ann, was the head volleyball coach at Rutgers and UMass Lowell where she became one of the winningest coaches in collegiate volleyball with 351 career wins. Tom’s sister, Elizabeth, is currently an assistant volleyball coach at Florida State. She helped guide the Seminoles to the 2023 ACC Championship and a No. 6 seed in the NCAA Tournament.

“We’ve always tried to put a priority towards if they (Tom and Elizabeth) are doing something, we are trying to be there,” said Jeff House. “The time that you spend and the time that you invest is going to pay off in the long run just of how close you are and all of the things that are really important to our family.” 

Family has always been important to the House’s, who moved seven times in 17 years while Tom and Elizabeth were becoming athletic stars.

“I was born in Somerset, New Jersey,” said Tom. “Then we moved to Charlottesville, Virginia, where I grew up from ages one to nine-years old. Then we moved to Chicago, Illinois. Next was Lexington, Kentucky where my dad coached at the University of Kentucky. Next I moved to Methuen, Massachusetts. The last town I lived in was Centerville, Ohio. I consider Centerville to be my hometown because I lived there from the sixth grade until the end of high school. It’s the city where I still have the most connections.”

With Tom and Elizabeth both at Florida State, Jeff and Ann have relocated from Ohio to the Florida Panhandle in order to spend as much time as possible with their children.

In addition to the sense of family that is so important to the House’s, academics has always been among the most important aspects. 

“My parents have always insisted that I stay on top of my academics,” said Tom. “They’ve always made sure I worked hard in school so I could have more options about how I can live my life in the future.”

Tom has been an academic standout since his arrival at Florida State. He recently earned Florida State Academic Dean’s List honors for the second time in his career (spring 2023 and fall 2023) and was named to the 2023 All-ACC Academic Men’s Basketball team and to the 2023 All-ACC Honor Roll.

House is majoring in political science and will be honored as the Outstanding Student of the Month in January 2024 by the Political Science Department at Florida State University.

“Your record of accomplishments stands out as they are as diverse as they are impactful,” said the faculty from the Political Science Department. “You’ve maintained an impressive record of excellence in the classroom and as a standout athlete on the men’s basketball team. Florida State University is a great place to be because of people like you and the communities you create. The Department of Political Science is proud to have you as part of our rank and file. The faculty in the Department of Political Science are incredibly proud of you and can’t wait to see what you’ll do next.”

Tom, whose godfather is a federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C., is already planning to on utilizing his degree in Political Science (with a minor in business) as he begins to explore his options following his graduation from Florida State in 2026.

“I’d like to combine my political science and business degrees and utilize the money I make from the basketball industry, whether it be from coaching or playing, to start my own business,” said Tom.

From swimming to basketball and from political science to business, Tom House has always made sure that he has options, and has always made the right choices.