Marshall University Athletics
BOGACZYK: Herd Ready to Dive Back into Swim Success
1/18/2016 12:00:00 AM | Women's Swimming and Diving
By JACK BOGACZYK
HERDZONE.COM COLUMNIST
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. - When Marshall's swimming and diving team returns to the pool for competition - finally - at noon Saturday at Fitch Natatorium against James Madison, Coach Bill Tramel hopes the Herd won't have forgotten what got them there.
He didn't mean traveling the streets and sidewalks of this city and the campus to get to the Herd home pool. He meant the first half of the 2015-16 season, which closed two months ago with an impressive effort at the talent-filled Nike Cup in Chapel Hill, N.C.
In that mid-November invitational, Marshall finished sixth, and the top four finishers were nationally ranked clubs. The Herd's swim against power conference program sent the team a message, and capped an opening to the season that began with a 7-0 start, the best in school history.
"I was very, very pleased with how our first semester went," said Tramel, the Herd's fourth-year coach. "We got off to a very slow start (in the West Virginia State Games), but had a big win over Cincinnati - a big upset. Davidson was a mild upset. We crushed Old Dominion, a Conference USA foe, pretty handily.
"We went to Ohio 7-0, which was nice, and we ran into a really upset team that lost for the first time (to the Herd) here last year. They were ready for us. We bounced back at the Nike Cup ââ'¬Â¦ We were really running with some big boys. It was a tremendous showing, with great individual performances."
In the Nike Cup, freshman Anna Lynch set school records in the 1,000 and 1,650 (mile) freestyle events. The Oakwood, Ohio, native also just missed the school mark in the 500 free. She wasn't alone in eye-popping performances to end a 2015 part of the schedule that has displayed the Herd's progress.
"When we look at that meet, midseason, we've gone to (the Zippy Invitational at) Akron in past, but I think really have graduated from that meet," Tramel said. "Everybody in the country is doing a similar meet that same weekend.
"(Assistant coach) Ian Walsh looked at times, and pointed out to me if we had attended the Northwestern Invitational, we likely would have won that meet. They had two or three Big Ten teams there. We're running with some big boys now, and that's certainly what our goal is, being able to compete against anybody."
Marshall has three meets in three weekends before breaking again to prepare for the Feb. 24-27 C-USA Championships in Atlanta. The Herd finished fourth in C-USA a year ago, the school's best showing in 10 seasons in the league. Tramel's young team - only one senior is on the roster - wants to top that.
"We finally get back into competition," said Tramel, pointing out most C-USA teams and other Herd foes got back into things a week earlier. "I think James Madison will be really a great meet -- fantastically close - it will go back and forth. I don't think ever beaten JMU (0-4).
"We go to Vanderbilt, and North Florida will be there, too. We won't have our divers at Vandy, so that will be a big challenge for us to compete there. Then we wrap up with the Marshall Invitational (Feb. 5-6), with Toledo and Ohio. We're resurrecting that event and we'll score it as an invitational, not dual meets. We'll use that as a final prep for Atlanta."
Asked what is different about the 2015-16 team from his previous Marshall squads, Tramel didn't point to getting better swimmers and divers in the recruiting process - although that surely has happened.
"I think this team understands how to train now," the Herd coach said. "And our freshmen really came in better than any freshman class that I've been with here. They all trained and competed throughout the entire summer and they really came in prepared for college swimming better than any other freshmen I've had here. I think that's really helped.
"I think that's a big part of our success. We're the strongest Marshall team that we've had right now. I think we're going to have a great Conference USA meet. I don't want to jinx us, but I do think we have some legitimate opportunities to win some individual conference championships."
In 10 years in C-USA, Marshall has had only two individual champions in swimming - and none since 2008, when Michaela Sceli won the 100 breaststroke title in 1:02.03. That's still the Marshall record. The other title came in the Herd's first year in the league, when Milla Kuurto took the 200 butterfly in 2:02.27.
The Herd prepared for the second portion of the season by heading to Tempe, Ariz., for between-semesters training at Arizona State. The Dec. 12-22 trip include a pair of two-hour workouts per day - plus the opportunity take in some sights as well as enhance team bonding.
"We got some good work in," Tramel said. "It was a little cold but the pool was warm, and did a number of things. The Geminid meteor shower was right then, and there was a mountain right across the street from our hotel - it really was more like a hill - and a bunch of us hiked up at night, laid down and looked up at shooting stars. We caught a couple of them there.
"It was a great experience. Michael Phelps was training there; we were practicing right before him. We were getting out of the pool as he was diving in, so the girls got to meet him. That was a big deal for them. On a day off, we went up to the Grand Canyon. It was a 3½-hour drive, but when are these kids going to have opportunity to do something like that, especially our internationals? Maybe not ever. And we did some great work, too."
Tramel said the Herd is poised to roll into the C-USA Championships in the facility that housed the 1996 Summer Games.
"The big thing is I feel for the first time we have everybody on board. We have everybody that wants to do this, that wants to see how good of an athlete they can really be," he said. "Whereas in the past, even if that outlook was present, some people didn't understand what it took to accomplish the things that they were talking about or were just flat out kidding themselves.
"I feel really good about where we are right now in our training. Just watching on a daily basis, some of the workout performance - it's really good, and that's going to pay off down the line. I think it already has with some of our swimmers, in breaking school records early in the year."
