At the first meeting with the entire team I finally got to put some names to faces, but I definitely felt like the outsider. Coach had built up the image of the team so much that they were already inseparable; keep in mind this is mostly freshmen and spent all of freshmen seminar together. Here we got the practice schedule and a few other forms, but overall it was just an informative meeting and a meeting to make sure everyone had everything they needed turned into the trainer as well as the NCAA, most swimmers/divers did not. At this point, Rita had officially called me the manager of the swim team. She had told me that was my title and had told me to put that title in the e-mails, but when she said it officially I felt like I was finally part of the team. In my mind it would be Coach, Steve, and me watching these, at the time 20 people, grow and become amazing swimmers.
The team had the first week of school off before practices started so I stopped into Coach’s and Steve’s offices every day at 1PM to see if they needed help with anything. Normally they said no, but one day Steve said that if I was not busy I could look up a camera and TiVo for the divers. Of course I would help. I did not have my computer at the time, so I jumped onto a school one and started looking. I found a good deal and essentially everything Steve was looking for at Best Buy about 20 minutes later. Steve then had me find back-ups just in case so that is one of the main things that I helped contribute to diving. Also during this time, Coach had individual meetings with the men’s and women’s teams. In both meetings, she talked about goals and how practices will not always be easy, but they need to keep a good attitude and work ethic and everything will turn out great in the long run.
One of the first things I that I did before school started was meet Steve, the diving coach and graduate assistant. Steve came from Alma College and he had literally dropped everything to come to Tiffin University. He is a really fun guy and I knew we would get along from the start, even though he was extremely stressed with his move. At the beginning, Steve and I were very similar, where if he needed advice I was there and if I took something Coach said in a certain way he would explain to me an alternative way to view it. Once school started, I was not able to stop into the athletic office at all barely so I started to drift away from Steve. He got more comfortable with Coach and I became just another student, but this is probably the way it should be anyway.
Coach said that in the summer there would not be a lot of work for me to do, but I stayed as a summer resident assistant so that I would be around in case anything came up. I talked a little bit over the summer, but not much. Closer to the end of summer I stopped in every Monday to see if she had a task for me to do. Usually she did have something small. Once it was to make a spreadsheet of the roster. Another time I had to e-mail all of the roster and get their schedules so that Coach could confirm that the practice times she wanted would work for everyone. Also in that time we had a talk about communication. I had just gotten a new phone and when she texted me and I had not yet put in her number, Coach was shocked. It was not that I had not put in her number yet but that I had neglected to tell her that I received a new phone. Coach talked to me about how I need to communicate more with her; the only time we talked was when I came in for meetings and there was a two week period where she did not text me first just to see if I would contact her and I did not. That is when I realized how important it was for me connect with Coach even in the small ways. I kept it up for a the end of July into August, but when I started resident life training as well as marching band at the same time, contacting Coach was not on my mind. This was to be the start of my downward spiral.
When I first heard that there was going to be a swimming and diving team at Tiffin University I went straight to the Athletic Directory, Lonny Allen, and asked him if I could be a part of this new program. He told me that he had not even hired anyone as a coach yet, but once he did he would let me know. He found Coach Margarita (Rita) Kalmikova and soon after I was in contact with her. We met in early December and she seemed very excited to have me join her team.
One of the first tasks that I had, unofficially spring semester of my junior year, was helping show prospective students are Tiffin University’s campus and helping to recruit online through a website call berecuited.com. I would show the students around campus and then watch as Coach told them her plans. She took them to the YMCA and told them about how they will be doing a lot of dry-land in the morning and that Tiffin University will be acquiring a 3-meter board and a record board and putting it in the YMCA. AS she talked about the record board, she would remind them all that they will be the first people on the record board because we are starting a legacy. Almost all of the swimmers that are a part of our team now joined Tiffin University’s Swimming and Diving Team because it was a chance to build a new program. The online form of recruiting was looking at swimmers who had majors that Tiffin University offered and send them an e-mail that Coach gave me to send them. I would work for about an hour to two hours a day for about four days the last month of school.
