Source: https://youtu.be/rCUX6kTEsAM
I’m Mel Stewart and this is a GMM podcast.
Joining me today, head coach of Mercersburg Academy, Matt Hurst.
Coming off a very successful Eastern, which is a huge competition.
It’s a very big deal in the prep school world.
Mercesburg boys won by almost 150 points.
The girls came up second to Germantown, just a hair’s breath away, 15 points off of winning that combined.
They won the combined championship.
Matt talks us through the process of how they got there. brought some interesting things into the mix this season.
Talks to us about that, unpacks it and we talk a little bit about the future.
I think you’re going to enjoy this.
Hey buddy, how you doing?
Congratulations.
We’re we’re publishers and you’ve been successful.
Yeah.
And we survived.
Yeah.
Thank you.
It was a lot of fun.
I appreciate the congratulations.
It’s always I mean, you know, having having been here, but I had one of our faculty members came up to me the the couple days before we left and he goes, “Hey, man.
How you doing?” I’m like, “I’m good.
How are you?” He goes, “You you got the Super Bowl coming up this weekend.” I was like, “No, the Super Bowl was last weekend.” He’s like, “No, no, no.
Eastern’s like this is this is your Super Bowl.” I was like, “Oh, okay.” Yeah.
But no, it was a lot of fun.
It, you know, 2 days, 48 hours of fun, excitement, a little bit of nerves, but yeah, we pulled it off.
Was a lot of fun.
I had a little PTSD thinking about this interview and talking to you cuz it brought back memories from that time and being in the ecosystem of of Merc, you know, on the runup to Eastern.
Yeah.
And it was it was like it was like this is the Olympics.
This is the Super Bowl.
And it was it was Yeah, it’s a huge deal, but it’s I love the warmth of of that microcosm of like this pressure that’s going to happen in the high, you know, in in prep school.
It’s kind of cool.
On the boys side, nearly 150 points over Philips Exitter.
Spire came in third, Germantown fifth.
Fourth, Philip Sexer fifth.
On the women’s side, you’re just on the bubble, 15 points roughly off of German Town.
So, men crushing it, women right there.
Yeah, that that title on the men’s side was decisive and the women are close.
What does that mean about where versus at right now?
Yeah.
I think what that means is, and I I’m I’m still So, we’re two weeks removed.
I’m still not sure I’ve wrapped my head around the season yet.
The postmortem takes a little bit longer every year, but but I but I what I’ve gotten to so far is that we’re a really good program.
A few years ago, Eastern’s started all started awarding a team championship, a program championship in addition to a boys team championship and a girls team championship.
So this year, as you pointed out, we won the boys team championship, we were 15 points out on the girls team championship, but for the second year in a row, we won the combined program championship.
Right.
So I think that’s that’s what that says.
And it’s interesting because coming in last year and sharing responsibilities with Glenn Newfeld who was in his last year here, we we really talked about internally between Glenn and myself and the rest of the staff.
We talked about, you know, can the boys win?
Where are the girls going to be?
But we train together every day.
I mean, we intermix boys and girls in the same lane.
They do the same sets.
They lift together.
We do separate out a little bit as we get into championship season, but but for the most part, we’re a program.
And and I think walking in a year ago, I was still very much like boys team championship, girls team championship.
And that’s probably also the NCAA background because that’s the way they award titles.
They don’t say, you know, Penn State was the best boys and girls.
No, it’s just boys, girls.
So, we’re just in a really great spot as a program and that that’s a testament to the kids.
That’s obviously a testament to the people who got here well before me.
Our my coaching staff has been here longer than I have, so a testament to them as well.
But yeah, we’re we’re in we’re in a great spot.
This year we had, speaking programmatically, we had two really great divers come to us thanks to our our relationship with the United States Naval Academy, uh, James Borman and MK Casmire, and they they did their jobs.
James won the boys one meter and MK got second.
And then we had another young lady, Trevy Ricks, on the boards, pick up 16th.
She was actually feeling pretty sick at the meet, but she decided she wanted to dive and go.
And yeah, it was.
So to answer the question, we’re just in a really good spot as an entire program top to bottom.
We rarely talk about it in swimming, but there’s a bunch of reasons why you would like swimming or you could make the case for swimming if someone doesn’t swim.
But culturally to me, looking back from, you know, decades later, my full experience in swimming and and and and at Mercesburg, you know, when you’re in high school and you’re a teenager was that we were always with women.
You know, you’re always training with women. you know, a deep respect for women and how hard they work and I I love that.
And also, if you’re a woman, you can achieve exactly what a man can achieve and we that’s not necessarily represented in societies today, but it is reflected in our sport.
Yeah, it it it is and it’s a wonderful part of the sport and I as you mentioned like the boys and the girls, yes, the the individual gender teams have their own identities and they work well where they do have time to themselves because the boys do boy things and the girls do girl things and they do appreciate the separation and we benefit from the separation when we do it.
But when it’s a combined practice, which is most of our workouts, the women bring a toughness to the pool that not that the guys don’t, but it’s different.
And the guys bring broad broadstrokes here.
The guys bring more of a levity and a and a gamesmanship to it.
Like it’s not break make or break.
It’s hey next to my friend male or female doesn’t matter.
Like let’s have some fun today and see how this goes.
And it it is unique.
It’s it’s interesting talking to other coaches here on campus who are gender separate programs and inevitably at some point it comes up.
Have you ever thought of having a combined practice?
Or what if they ran together?
Or what if they, you know, shot together for soccer?
And they’re like, “Oh, we never really considered that.
This is not the way the other sports work.” But here, it’s I mean, it’s it’s it it’s a huge part.
This year specifically, it was a huge part of why we were able to do so well on the men’s side and realistically do so well on the women’s side.
A year ago, our girls were in third.
Germantown Academy is a behemoth in in Easter at Easterns and in prep school swimming.
We actually had a lead over them when swimming concluded on Friday night.
So it’s two days prelims finals.
When swimming concluded on Friday night, day one, we actually had a lead on Germantown on the women’s side.
They took the lead once the diving scores got calculated in because as good as they are at swimming.
They’re more dominant at Easterns and diving.
So they took a slight lead into day two and then we clawed back.
We made it interesting in day two.
Our girls swam their minds out. we clawed back and and just but the the gap with diving was a little bit too big and but yeah, programmatically I mean it it is I’m again I’m still processing what we were able to do this year.
Congratulations.
Let’s let’s let’s dial it in.
Let’s get a little granular.
We have to talk about Matt Rouse.
I mean he’s that 100 fly 4479 100 back 4702 anchors on the sub three minute 400 free relay.
Uh what happened with him this year?
He’s you know it’s it seems like he popped off.
He he really did.
So, so Matt is was actually a new addition to us this year.
He had swam at Amayas Aquatic Club throughout his high school years.
He did not compete in high school.
He was he did online charter school and we got a call last spring or I want to say around this time from his club coach and said, “Hey, I’ve got a guy, good swimmer, great kid, wants to go collegiately, needs a little work in school, needs a little more time to develop in the pool.
What options are there for Mercersburg?” cuz I know we’re past the application deadline.
So, as we always do, like good relationship with the coach, had some conversations, contacted mom and dad, good conversations, had him come out to campus, just tried to get a feel for him and what he was looking for, and then went through the process.
We were he was able to gain admittance into Mercersburg.
Throughout the summer, he trained at Emmas and he actually had a really good summer.
He like flying under the radar at nationals in in June.
He was 2011 202 long course two back 56 in the 100 back 56 long course or 55 in the 100 back 56 long course 100 fly so the the yards times were coming.
So anyway, he got to campus and Matt Matt has been Matt won’t say 10 words to you in a day, but there but there are 10 good words there 10 impactful words.
He he actually won our our team award this year for leadership and impact, greatest impact on the boys team.
Well, because he’s he he’s the type of athlete that every coach hopes for.
Comes in every day, doesn’t have any terrible days, he has some bad days, he has some great days, but for the most part, he’s pretty consistent. came in every day with his hackey sack and by the time the end of this, you know, we get to Eastern, we’ve got a whole boys team in a hacky sack circle and he just he’s really dedicated to what what we do and he’s goal oriented and processoriented.
So, he he just came in and whatever the workout was, he did it with intention.
Whatever the goal was, he asked questions around it and and was able to consistently apply himself to the pursuit of of what we were doing.
Most of my conversations with him were like, “Hey, so for him, his long course times were better than short course times.” So, he’s a good swimmer.
And we were teaching him how to use his underwaters.
He has them, but didn’t know how to use them.
And he’s still developing them and he’s going to get to do that even more in college.
But taking some of his raw skills and teaching him how to refine them and then consistently work them over over again to the point where it’s just wrote in routine. and and that’s that’s the magic to Matt Krauss.
But I mean, tremendous leader, tremendous work ethic, really again really dedicated to the process of improvement and and that was his major contribution to the team.
But yeah, having him this year was was gamechanging for sure.
And Ray Luz at Indiana is a very fortunate guy because after this year at Mercersesburg, Matt is going to Matt’s not going to have any issues his freshman year.
He’s not going to he’s not going to have any academic issues.
There’s there’s no cold butler in the face.
This is like he’s gone he’s he’s traveled through the fire.
He has that academic impact is enormous.
Yep.
And yeah, he’s doing he’s doing well in his courses and and that was part of the conversation with the folks when we discussed him coming here, right?
He wanted before he decided to come to Merchesburg, he was looking for the power for experience.
He was understanding that it may not happen, right?
But but that’s what he wanted. uh but he wanted to swim in college and his focus was the next right step.
So Mercersburg was the next right step.
And actually what doesn’t show up on the score sheet is so Eastern’s ended on Saturday.
We took Sunday off obviously.
Monday, Tuesday we did some light training and weight room testing.
Wednesday we did an unofficial time trial here at the pool.
We put the pads in and the kids electronic timing.
The kid the kids who wanted to swim were allowed to pick an event to swim.
Yeah.
Matt did two back.
His best time from midseason was 1426.
He went 1414.
Yeah.
And I I I’ll tell like so I I was texting with Luke Ryan at Indiana afterwards and I said at atund 150 yards I thought he was going 139 and I mean 151 still his best time by a second or sorry 141 still his best time by a second in a little bit but yeah he it’s he’s been again he’s been great to have and yes the times are tremendous but when you talk about the boarding school experience and what that extra year can be and you know last time you said the phrase transformative experience Matt has transformed here and he has in large part transformed our program just by the way that he goes about doing things.
Yeah.
Rinse and repeat.
This is this is this is a this is a tradition at Mercersburg and it it’s just so exciting to see it and and with you with him in this year.
Talk to me about the the relay that 259 for a free.
Yeah.
Pretty big statement.
I was I was I was going through the split before he popped on and all strong across the board.
Yeah. talk to me about that.
Yeah, so the relay last year, well, I’ll give away a coaching secret.
I always start with the 400 freestyle relay because whether it’s a dual meet, easterns, invite, I always want to win the 400 freestyle relay and there’s probably two reasons for that.
One of them is because I used to swim the 400 freestyle relay and it was always the last day of the meet and I enjoyed the responsibility of being on that relay on the last day when it mattered.
And so that’s that piece of it.
So there’s the personal piece and then there is probably the philosophical chip on my shoulder piece which is whether we’re going to win the meet or lose the meet.
I want the last impression of Mercersburg for everybody else when we leave the building to be, man, what a four- free relay.
So, if we’re gonna get beat, but we beat you in the four- free relay, okay, because our last memory of your last memory of us is, “Wow, that was a heck of a relay.” So, we built the four relay.
We had actually gone back and forth as to whether or not to have Matt even on that relay cuz we were we’re pretty deep in the 100 freestyle for, you know, high school program.
We’ve got several guys who have been 45 or can split 45 and potentially split 44.
Teaser, right?
Matt went 43 at the end of that relay.
But lap, so last year at Easterns, we got second.
I’m pretty sure we went three, broke our school record and we’re just touched out by Andover and I really wanted to get under 3 minutes.
So we loaded the relay and I had asked Matt earlier in the week.
I asked the boys earlier in the week, not just Matt.
I said, “Hey, what do you guys think the best order is? what do you think the personnel is?
And and they were all pretty close in they’re all in agreement in personnel and they were all pretty close in order.
So yeah, I just so so that was the plan going in is let’s make this the strongest four free relay we can.
I didn’t know that we would have a large the large point lead the way we did over Andover.
So I didn’t want to leave anything to chance if the meat was coming down to the four- free relay.
Those were the four boys that I thought had the most left in the tank to to bring the meat home for us and and they did the job.
Before we move on to the girls, would you like to highlight anybody on the on the boys side that you were like proud of?
They made a they made a they made a big gain.
They were crucial.
Oh boy.
The list is too long, right?
And I don’t want to leave anybody off the list.
What I will say is this.
The guys I want to highlight on the team, and it’s going to be very similar for the girls side, are the guys who got third, who are our third or fourth scorer in each individual event, or the guys that held down the B relays in the morning to give us some options or some switching people out.
Coming into this year, we knew what Matt was capable of.
We talked about him.
We knew what Josh Lopez had done previously.
We knew what some of our returners.
We knew what Jaden Quan had done.
And and obviously, we had mid-season.
So, so we had some strength, but in prior years, the strength of the program has really been what postgrads showed up, and there were multitudes of them.
This year, we only had a few.
So, the conversation across the team this year was in order to do what we want to do and and survive survive the rigors of day in and day out and the length of our season, we have to operate as the best team.
And everybody has to find a way to contribute to what it is we’re doing.
And for some of you, those guys that were third or fourth or fifth on our scoring chart, for some of you, that is making sure you show up to practice every day, learn from the guys that are faster than you, and try to improve yourself and hold yourself to that standard.
And and they they absolutely did.
I think we there might have been one race, one event where we didn’t have four guys score or two.
And that like we didn’t do that a year ago.
And that’s that’s why we were able to be as successful as we were because the team, every every guy and every girl on this program legitimately thought and legitimately did have an opportunity to score in their events.
On the on the girls side, you’re 15.5 points off the off the off the title.
Uh that’s that’s a that’s a relay swing.
What do you what do you take from that that near miss?
Uh I don’t know that I take it as a miss.
I’ll start there.
Yeah.
So, and I again I’ll go back to last year.
Last year we were a relatively young team in terms of in terms of who was in a position to score.
We were an old team in terms of roster size.
We had 28 seniors last year.
Not all on the women’s side, but I think we were 18 on the women’s side and 10 on the boys.
So last year we didn’t look great on paper on the women’s side and we ended up we ended up third by nine points behind Germantown and Pen Charter.
So then coming back this year we didn’t really graduate a lot of points.
We graduated maybe 10 points. a great kids, but just not a lot of point scorers.
And we knew that the girls really, it was our our sophomore class from two years ago.
So, this year’s junior class, they had stepped up.
They trained well, they raced well.
So, the question was, could they step into that leadership role this year?
Uh, we did benefit obviously from some senior year additions.
We had a couple of postgrads join us.
And then we had cuz I had had a full year of being in this seat and had been announced for two years.
Our ninth grade class was stronger this year than it had been in the past.
So those girls kind of again the women’s team similarly to the guys.
It was it’s the same conversation on both sides programmatically.
Be the best team.
What is your contribution?
And your contribution needs to outweigh your credit, right?
It it’s got to be team first.
So our women similarly like stepped in.
They wanted to race.
We started we started building the relays early and looking at those options.
So So on paper going into Easterns again not favored.
I had us depending upon who did the numbers and I had us somewhere between second and fifth depending on how it all shook out.
I had Germantown as the hands down favorite and then Pen Charter Petty and Mercersburg in some combination 2 three four and maybe exit depending on how they stepped up.
I mean, they have men of board men, so you can never count them out.
But from from the jump from Friday morning prelims, our girls came out to race and they reckless abandon racing.
You know, over the course of a high school meet or really any championship meet when you’re dealing with teenagers, someone’s going to cry.
And it happened.
But I but and this is no joke.
It was the first time ever I have never had an athlete come up to me and cry about not going a best time.
The first I’m sure they wanted to go a best time, but the first words out of every mouth after the tears subsided was I just wanted to score for points for the team.
I I’m not going to get to score.
I just wanted to score.
What do I do?
And and the answer was either a go warm down and get ready for the next one or go warm down and get ready for the relay or your meat is done in the pool.
Now your contribution is to make sure that you are behind every lane.
Everyone knows that Mercersburg is here and that you have no voice when they leave here.
And every single person accepted whichever charge was theirs, they accepted it.
So with the women, when you talk about the guys relays, the women actually had a better meet than the boys in terms of the relays.
So our women demolished our school records in the 200 medley, the 200 freestyle, and the 400 freestyle relay.
So yes, would it have been nice to bump Germantown?
Absolutely.
And 15 points, can I go back and look at the score sheet and be like, well, this this like it was an easy it’s an easy look to say, yeah, here’s how we would have won.
But to think about how those 23 girls came together and the 23 or four boys, you know, stood by their side and helped them, too.
It’s it’s a near miss, but they they swam so well and and and they swam for each other and and when it comes to a program, that’s the most I can ask for. coaches try to bring everything to the to the deck and then beyond the pool.
And I know that you have an a unique story, an interesting story.
And I want you to talk to me a little bit about Samantha Livingston, the groundwork, the obstacles, it’s a dynamic.
Yeah.
Tell me about that ingredient and and how that that that that was woven into what you were doing this year.
Yeah, absolutely.
So Samantha Livingston, Samantha Arsenal Livingston, Olympic gold medalist for Team USA in 2000.
So she is now in the performance consulting space, mental health space.
She has her company called W AI, the way the whole athlete initiative.
And I had heard about Samantha from some professional colleagues.
I had heard Bill Dorancott talk about her.
I know she works with the team down at BS.
And so I had reached out.
She swam in New England.
I used to coach in Connecticut.
So her former coach and my former former coach were actually close friends.
So, I had known of her because we’re about the same age swimming wise.
So, I figured at least I’m going to catch up with someone from the same era as me and let’s have a chat.
We hit it off.
She was tremendous.
So, again, the support of our school, Mercersburg, was like, “Yep, bring her in, work with the athletes, see see how this pans out.” So, we brought Sam in early in the year, right around October, early October, she came in and she did she had done some pre-me calls with me just to talk about where I was professionally, what how she could assist me and and what she could do for the team.
So, she came in did a whole day, day and a half with us with with the athletes.
And it was really talking from her own perspective, and I don’t want to give too much of what she does away, but talking from her perspective as an 18-year-old on the Olympic podium. you know, she had worked so hard for this her whole life.
And like so many of us, we think that the outcome is going to reaffirm us or change us or or answer all the doubts, you know, set right what doesn’t feel right.
And so she’s standing, she tells her own story.
She’s standing on the podium, Olympic gold around her neck, thinking that it was now all going to make sense and it didn’t hit the way she had expected.
And then now you know 20 years removed of that she’s started this whole athlete athlete initiative which talks to the athletes about you know it’s the process that that helps you it’s it’s it’s the relationships you build it’s it’s being a whole athlete.
She shared this scale with us.
Uh this is it’s hard to see but basically they check I keep this on my desk so they keep check in every day thriving gliding surviving fluctuating struggling or sinking.
So, it’s just a quick little check-in.
Great for the athletes.
So, yeah, work with Sam and you get one of these things.
So, anyway, so Sam set that tone for us and then we just throughout this the school year, we went back to what she talked about and we debrief every meet as a team.
We take 20 or 30 minutes after every dual meet, every invitational, we’ll sit down and have it like basically a chalk talk, coffee session, hot chocolate session, and and go through everything.
Often referred back to those things.
What do we have control of?
So having Sam was a game changer.
She and I are, you know, we stay in touch.
She helped me tremendously.
I was at a point in my career where I have I’ve had obviously professional relationships and assistant coaches and associate head coaches and head coaches that I’ve worked with, but I think just by nature, I’m somewhat insular when it comes to asking for help and asking for guidance.
And Sam for me was really great because I could ask her really whatever I wanted without the context of her knowing me in this space or knowing the athletes and just have a really objective person to sit and be like, “Hey, have you thought about this or what about this learning model or what about that emotional response or hey, if you separate the boys and the girls, is that going to help you achieve what you want or do you need to keep them together?” And it also benefited my wife because she didn’t have to hear me come home and complain about swimming every single day.
So, so Sam was great.
Yeah, she she is very much an integral part of what we were able to accomplish this year as a program.
What I hear in all that is something that there was it’s a huge piece that we missed for decades in the sport.
Some people had it organically, but some people didn’t.
And it’s uh you got to process when you go to war, when you compete, when you’re when you’re putting it all on, you have to process it.
If you don’t, you hold it in your body.
Yep.
If you hold it in your body, it comes out in weird ways that can affect you down the line.
And we see this with athletes who pay the bank so much.
So, and it’s not just physical, but it’s also that that emotional payment and they don’t process it and then they’ll they’ll go through a year or two where they flatline and they don’t know why.
It’s uh fascinating.
Also, the the other thing, we talked about it off camera.
It’s like, yeah, you win a you you go through this whole process. you get to the top, if you’re lucky, if you’ve had the right parents, the right coach, the right training, the right because it’s it’s a whole lot of luck and then you do it and you’re like, I’m still the same person.
This didn’t solve all my problem.
I I got shingles six months Yeah, it was not it was not good.
But you remember back when everybody remembers back.
I think they’re going to remember back and they’re going to remember back to you and they’re going to remember back to Merc and the December January process.
Yeah.
Before Easterns and that’s the good stuff.
That’s that’s that’s what we earn and that’s what we take away.
Yeah.
And that and that is that is absolutely and you know that is the part that I think as coaches and as I’ve gotten older, right, we talk try to talk to the athletes about like you’re not going to remember the sets.
You’re not going to remember how cold it was in the morning. you are going to remember the people you spent your time with and how they made you feel and how you made them feel and and what it was like doing all those things.
You’re not always going to remember what time you swam in a given year.
And it it just it’s interesting.
So, in that same ilk, so my college coach actually passed away the day before Eastern started.
He was getting ready to take Southern Connecticut.
Tim Quill, he was getting ready to take Southern Connecticut to Northeast 10, which is their championship meet, and he he had suffered a a heart attack and and passed away.
So I I have since I left Southern I coached there, too.
But since I left, I hadn’t really spent a lot of time going back to the school, going back to the program.
I kept in touch with my roommates, but but that was it.
And and so Tim’s tragic passing and I mentioned this to the team really made me reflect on like what we were about to do as a program going to Easterns, but then also my time in college and and I had had what I will call a tenuous relationship with Southern Connecticut in my time after leaving.
And none of that really really didn’t make a difference.
It really didn’t matter.
I reconnected with some of my teammates who I hadn’t talked to in a while.
You know, facetimed with one of my roommates and his two little girls who I hadn’t seen in a bit.
And it just again that it really and college swimming was hard and it wasn’t always fun but but the closure on it all was and even again for a spot where I had had a a complicated relationship none of that really mattered one because the death of a close friend provides perspective and at the end of the day I don’t remember how hard all the sets were but I do remember that my teammates and my relay mates and my roommates we were always there for each other and it didn’t matter if it’s been 10 minutes or 10 years.
So yeah, I mean I think that that that is something we want we want them all to take away from this and and try to have some recognition of it before it’s 20 years removed.
Sounds like you had a had a you had an experience that’s a that’s a lot.
It seems like it seems like energy builds up and always that you never you know always in the biggest moments in our life when we’re being tested and we’re we’re we’re preparing for this huge challenge.
Seems like there’s always this outlying factor that happens that that late, you know, whether it’s in your personal relationship or something happened with your parents or with a loved one or a coach, it always seems like that stress enters in and you have to you have to you have to carry that on your shoulders and process it while you’re doing that thing going to Easter.
Yeah.
Yep.
Yeah.
Yeah, you do.
And again and Yes.
And I and the perspective of that now is, you know, we we did not all season talk about having to win easterns or the points it would take to win easterns.
We talked about what can you control, how can you contribute on a daily basis, and having a plan, keeping it simple, doing the simple things better, because you’re right, whether it’s whether it’s something tragic or just something annoying or something, something will inevitably happen, could inevitably happen, but the more we rehearse preparation for the moment, the more likely we are to arrive when the moment comes to us.
So RT like again going back to the team for a bunch of high school students, high school age students, they were they were so wellprepared and just believed in themselves and their training and their teammates and they did the simple things better than we’ve ever done them and and that’s that’s where results came from.
I so last bit on so so what I told them what I told the team on the bus because they didn’t know they didn’t know that Tim was my coach and I and I said to them I I’m gonna try not to choke up here.
Okay.
So, so Tim Quill used to tell us he was very meat and potatoes coach.
So, I swam sprint events, but I never did a sprint set in my life other than like a 25 at taper time from the dive.
He would always tell us, “Swim here now under these conditions.” And you’ve got to remember this is division 2 swimming in the early 2000s.
We got a cap, a pair of goggles, a drag suit, and and a brief.
That was your team outfitting for the year.
If the football team didn’t have enough guys, you got an extra t-shirt.
Meal money on breaks was $10 a day.
Performance fuel at championships was Go-Gurt and Pop-Tarts.
And And he knew that.
And it it had to not matter because it was our job to do our job.
So it didn’t matter if we ran out of Go-Gurt and it was finals on the last night or we had extra money that day and we got we got cliff bars. you had to go and you had to swim and you had to make the most of it.
The one memory that stuck in my mind was my I think it was my junior year, my first year as a captain.
We’re swimming practice and so Southern Connecticut is in New Haven for those who don’t know.
There’s another college people have heard of in New Haven.
It’s called Yale.
So, we’re swimming practice on I think a Friday afternoon, probably an hour in.
And Tim comes onto the deck and he pulls myself out and our my co my co- captain Mike and he goes, “Guys, the vans are out back.
Okay, get the boys out of the water.
You need to be dressed and in the vans in 10 minutes.
Tim, where are we going?
We have a dual meet with Yale.
Don’t tell anybody.
Get them in the vans.
Excuse me.
What?
Boys, this is not time for questions.
You will swim here now under these conditions.
So, literally, he walks out with our assistant coach.
They get in the vans.
Mike and I pull every all the boys out of the water.
Guys, get in the locker room.
Tim and CJ are in the vans.
We got to go.
Throw everybody in the vans. drive across town to Yale.
Now, we’re so delusional that we’re like, we’re gonna we can race them this year.
We’re going to make it.
We’re going to make an impact.
First event, 200 medley relay, take your mark.
Their backstrokers are at the 15 meter mark.
Our guys are somewhere around the 10 or 11 and we’re like, well, maybe we’re not going to win this year.
But it was just that mentality of like we’re going to go make the most of it.
And we swam well for us.
They handed it to us.
But yeah, so that was that was my little anecdote and story for the team of like, hey, when we roll into Easterns, we’re as prepared as we’re going to be.
No idea how anybody else prepared.
Don’t care, but we’re going to race and you guys are going to be ready.
And they were.
You fortified them with more than yogurt, yogurts, and Pop-Tarts.
We did.
We did.
Yes.
Yeah.
The nutritional st the nutrition staples have improved drastically since 2003.
Well, I I know that we’re we’re Eastern’s just happened and you’re trying to unpack it and but if you’re you know if you’re looking ahead, what’s it going to take to to how do you level up next year?
Yeah.
So, leveling up, couple things.
One, and I think the hardest part right now is getting them back in the water and getting them refocused.
We did that time trial on the Wednesday.
We took a long weekend from the pool.
They still had school responsibilities, but we don’t our kids don’t get a lot of the breaks that some of their peers do and at times that’s hard.
So they got Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday off.
And then we got back in this week and we’ve been going pretty light this week.
Just kind of get back into the swing of things.
We will train again next week.
It’s our school spirit week next week, which is our urban marshall week.
So our our schedule’s a little bit fluctuated, but again, just get kind of getting them back in the routine of being together and doing some things.
Leveling up for us looks like in the spring block making sure that we we’re going to spend the majority of the spring focusing on our weaknesses whether it’s breaststroke for IMERS or underwater kick for really everybody.
You know, just the the things the things that we need to improve on.
We’re going to spend the spring primarily focusing on those.
We do race long course in the spring.
So getting some of our newer athletes into and familiar with long course racing, [snorts] making sure that our international students or our national level domestic students get into the long course pool, which we’ll switch when we come back from spring break in a couple of weeks.
And that’s the athletic piece in the weight room.
Again, we’re blessed to have a full-time strength and conditioning coach.
He he and I, we do performance testing at three points throughout the season and then one at before they leave.
So we’ve identified areas both strength, mobility, and stability that we need to improve upon.
So our spring programming there is built upon those elements.
So that’s the strength piece.
And then the team building piece.
We’re going to spend a little more time this spring doing a deeper dive debrief onto what we did well, what we need to improve on.
As a school, we do surveys from the athletes where they can give feedback on the program.
I will do individual check-in meetings with the athletes and a little bit of a worksheet where they can and give some hopefully honest and candid feedback of like, hey, this worked well, but I’d like to see it grow into this or evolve into that.
You know, we’re going to get Samantha back involved with the group a little bit now that Eastern is over and take some guidance from her and and set that tone.
But I think we’ve done we’ve done a really good job embracing the standard of what it means to be a Merc a member of the Merc Swimming and Diving program.
We now need to refine that standard and reflect upon the standard.
And through the I hate to call it recruiting, but it is recruiting.
Through the recruiting cycle, we’ve gotten a lot of interest from some great people, some really good athletes.
So hopefully from an admissions standpoint, we yield those athletes and those people because obviously it helps us from a performance standpoint, but we do look at character and we do look at we do look at personal personality because when we’re talking about a standard and a culture of performance and process, we need people that fit and mesh or willing to adapt and learn, right?
And that’s part of boarding school in general.
So, we’re going to refine some of our pieces and processes so that when our our new team members get here in the fall, they can slot in, understand what the Mercersburg standard is, and and help us grow that and and hopefully pick up where we left off.
You said recruiting, it’s soft recruiting.
It’s really letting people know.
Yeah, it’s it is it’s soft recruiting because you’re you’re talking to to coaches and people who they’re like, “Look, there’s something missing and I need and and I I think you might be able to to manage that for us.” And it it always feels like it’s it always feels like, you know, it’s somebody who wants to go to a better college.
Yeah.
And that’s Yes, you’re right.
And that that is it.
I like soft recruiting.
I like better than recruiting because that is the conversation.
I don’t go out very much and say, “Hey, Mel, come talk come talk to me about swimming at Mercersburg.” it’s more your coach or your parents or someone who knows you said, “Hey, I know this guy Mel and he’s doing really well here, but maybe he needs a little something more or he’s interested in going to college or you know, whatever it is.” So, that’s how the conversation starts.
The conversation continues from our end of here’s what a Merc education and a Merc experience will do could do for your child.
Part of that experience in the case of your kid is the swimming program or the diving program.
And this is how the things we learn in the pool will be an asset to what they learn in the classroom and how the skills they learn in the classroom and socially will be an asset to what they’re trying to accomplish in the pool.
So that yes, that is the conversation.
It is a it is a conversation around human development and opportunity.
It’s not a hey, come swim for us and we’ll give you all this money because that’s not at all how it works. not how it works for just I want to talk about early Marshall because it’s coming up and you mentioned it when in my day it was a huge deal it is I didn’t understand it you know that first year it was like whoa and you were in it and I was and I wasn’t really participating much in it because I was busy doing other things I loved it so much it’s some of my fondest memories can you for someone who wouldn’t who doesn’t understand they’re outside the colleague can you kind of explain it yeah but first I got to know Irving or Marshall I was Marshall you’re Marshall okay so Irving and is they are the two literary societies within Mercenberg Academy and so Irving Marshall is one of our oldest traditions.
William man Irving is who the Irving Society is named after and then initially Mercersburg Academy was known as Marshall College.
Marshall College and eventually left the academy grounds and moved up to Lancaster, Pennsylvania to join Franklin College.
So now you have Franklin and Marshall College.
So Irving and Marshall societies are pretty much as old as the school itself.
And over the hundred plus years, it has evolved from a week of spirited debate and yeah, a week of spirited debate and academia competition to a full-blown Mercersburg in-house Olympics.
So basically it’s like for the Harry Potter fans out there, it’s if like Raven’s Claw and Slytherin, whatever the other ones, Hufflepuff and and Hot Well, yeah.
If they all went headto head, like that’s what we’re doing, but our school is just split into two instead of into four.
And it’s a multi-day competition.
They the students compete in swimming, swimming and diving, volleyball, basketball, dodgeball.
There’s a trivia bowl, and then I might be missing one.
Oh, they do a phonathon where they do fundraising and the team that raises the most money gets some points there.
So, you accumulate points over the course of the week.
The culminating experience is as it was 100 plus years ago which is declamation which is a speaking competition where students have to try out.
They are then selected by their society and the students who participate in declination stand in front of the entire school in our theater center stage and you have about seven minutes to deliver an oration and it’s not acting but it is a true speaking competition.
We bring in judges from the outside and they judge and they rank and then everyone leaves declamation and then there’s a school dance afterwards to celebrate because we go off on to spring break after that. at the end of which at the end of the dance our head of school comes in with the final tallies and then one society will win Irving or Marshall.
And then the the rub on the sports is if you did a sport if you did a varsity sport you cannot participate in that event during Irving Marshall week.
So none of my swimmers can swim.
They can dive but they cannot swim.
So it’s it’s a lot of fun.
It gets the whole school together.
And then as Mel pointed out, any any alumni you ask will tell you Irving or Marshall.
And it’s the the the pinnacle of it, the the seven minute it’s a every I I just remember every year going I did not know my my peer in school was that good.
They were I’m like they’re all going to go on to be president.
It was amazing.
Yes, it was extraordinary how Yeah, it was it was Yeah, they transformed on stage and I would and it seemed like they transformed after that that experience.
So yeah, it it was the closest thing I’d ever seen to to sport and I real, you know, gained a real appreciation for Yes.
Marshall.
Marshall Irving are the defending champs from what from what I hear and what I saw at swim practice the other day.
Irving Marshall swim practice.
Marshall might have a chance this year, so we’ll find out.
All right, we’ll know Thursday night.
All right.
This it’s Yeah, it’s it’s a it is a it’s a unique experience.
Can you just, you know, for anybody listening, this is this unique culture to Mercy’sburg and it is awesome.
It is one of these things you remember for the rest of your life fondly.
But as as a college preparation experience, just, you know, everything that we’ve talked about, if if you’re talking to somebody, you know, like you said, I I described it as soft recruiting.
If you’re having that conversation with a coach on a club team, you know, how would you explain that?
How would you explain Mercersburg to that that club coach who who might that one kid who might need this this something more?
Yeah, I I explain it very much like I I take the college prep angle is what I do.
I and I and I try to appeal to the way I felt as a club coach, which was I wish I could do more for this kid because again, broad strokes outside of boarding school, traditional school model, you have school, you have home, and you have swim.
Like you have those three areas and they try to work the best they can together, but realistically at the end of the school day, for the most part, school is done for the day.
At the end of swim practice, swim is done for the day and home fills in the rest of the gaps.
And it again attempts to be collaborative, but isn’t always.
And I as a club coach, I always felt like I wish I could be more involved or more helpful when it comes to their school or I see that there’s this character gap or learning gap or like this kid seems to want or need more or that I knew that there was something going on at home, not necessarily bad something at home, but just something going on at home that was carrying into swim practice.
And some kids were great at sharing and others were not.
So just always wishing I could help more.
So that’s the appeal I take when I do talk to the club coaches and it’s look I I’m I’m coming from the same place as you are.
You want this kid to be as successful as possible.
Here’s what we offer.
I mean obviously they’re here with us 24/7.
We offer essentially year round training similarly to the way that college does right over breaks.
Yes, the athletes go home.
They go back to their club but that’s what they’re going to be looking at in college.
We by nature of being away from the family unit at home, the maturation process here is accelerated.
We do expect the students to read their emails and respond.
We do expect them to do their own laundry.
We do expect them to look after and be stewards of our school and their classmates.
And there are leadership positions built within the school within the sports programs so that they can so they can build those leadership and character positions.
And then academically, obviously, the rigor is here.
And for the the students who want to go on to highly academically selected schools, we have the curriculum that that can help them get there.
We have the resources beyond the school day.
And we talk about the the long blue line of Mercersburg people who have gone off into the world and made an impact in other places.
And our advancement team and our office of alumni, they do a tremendous job of keeping our alums and our our previous graduates engaged both philanthropically and both to help current students and come in.
So that’s the conversation is is this this is not me if it’s his club coach.
This is not me trying to take Melvin Stewart away from your club team and take credit for his athletic accolades.
This is me seeing helping you meet Melvin where he’s at and then let’s together figure this out.
And I tell our I tell the club coaches and I tell the kids because I do also operate as their club coach when they’re here.
You don’t have to attach to Mercersburg.
If you want to that’s up to you.
Great.
But if you want to represent your team from home for your four years here and stay attached to them in USA swimming, perfect.
We’ve got a bunch of kids who do YMCA.
They’re unattached year round.
They go to YMCA Nationals, they represent their YMCA team and and that’s great with me because I remember how important it was for me to be at YMCA Nationals and how important it was to me to be a part of those relays.
I don’t want to take that opportunity from a kid.
The only time I tell the kids, the only time I may ask you, not make you, but may ask you to affiliate Mercersburg is if you’ve made an Olympic trials cut while swimming here representing us, I will request that you rep Mercesburg at trials. or if it’s US juniors or US nationals and we are one person shy of a relay and you are the one person I will ask you to consider joining Mercersburg so that we can swim the relay at those meets but outside of that I’m not going to ask you it’s up to you and a lot of them choose to represent Mercers and and most of the club coaches are supportive of it I do also reach out to the club coaches at the end of or at the beginning of every year and just say hey this is what I saw what can I help you with what can you help me with and try to keep that dial dialogue open.
I think the more people again the more people that are here as a resource for the kids ultimately we’re all more likely to achieve our end goal.
No, it it’s it was the same.
Yeah.
Years years and years ago it was the same.
You could everybody sign for the club and and and and every so often when Mercesburg would spin up and and show up at juniors or show up at nationals or show up at Y nationals, but it was always Yeah. relay.
I Yeah, I like that.
If if I’m somebody that’s young and I’m like, “Hey, I’m really interested in this.” I I know that you guys you’re you’re you’re famous for your clinics and your your camps.
Describe that camp experience because Merceresburg camps are are available this summer, but uh what what can you expect from that?
Yeah, so we do we run two weeks of camps and again this the camps and clinics date back well before May.
The expectations the way they run, we’re running camps the 14th to the 19th of June and then the 21st to the 26th.
It’s a Sunday to a Thursday.
It’s a residential camp.
You do have the option to be a day camper if you want or live in the area, but we do also offer residential.
So, it’s it’s an option one for an overnight camp experience for those who are ready for it or whose parents think they’re ready for that step.
It’s an opportunity to meet some some friends in the sport of swimming.
And then from in terms of structure, we hit we hit all four strokes, we hit starts, turns, typical stuff.
But what I think we do differently than some other camps is that similarly to the way I coach our high school athletes is we put a lot of intention into the athletes taking ownership of the process.
So I have worked at camps before or gone to camp right myself where this is very clearly babysitting. you’re getting dropped off because or or you thought or or like you thought going to swim camp would be cool so you’re getting dropped off but here it’s an interactive camp and we ask the students and I say students we ask the students and swimmers to participate in what we’re doing so we do a classroom session every day and the classroom sessions vary what sometimes what I will do is have our visiting coaches if there’s a topic that they’re particularly passionate about or have an interest in I have them present because I like to learn myself and I also don’t like to do all the talking.
So like last year we had an assistant from Yale, an assistant from Princeton here working with us in camp and the two of them present presented NCAA recruiting and they did one for our older kids and then one for our younger kids.
So like talking about character and talking about doing well in school and talking about being a good teammate and what does that look like?
We do video feedback, but I think something again something we do a little bit differently here is when you arrive at Mercenberg swim camp, you get a notebook in addition to your camp t-shirt and your camp shirt.
And that notebook is an interactive journal for your time here.
So every day we start with a morning question and a reflection.
We ask the athletes to set an intention for the day.
When they go into the education sessions, we ask them to take age appropriate notes, but take some notes.
And for some of the little guys, it’s just doodling pictures, but it’s notes.
And then when we do video feedback, so we film the student, we film the athletes and then instead of our counselors or our coaches taking that iPad, doing the voice over and sending it home to mom and dad, we sit with the kid and say, “Okay, in your freestyle, here’s what I’d like you to think about and work on in your backstroke, your breaststroke.” So they have to then take notes and in their own writing or their own method, convey what it is we’re sharing with them in a tangible manner.
And the depth of the feedback is different dependent upon whether you’re an 8-year-old or a 16-year-old with, you know, power four aspirations, but it’s it’s feedback.
And our staff, we have a variety of skills.
So, we have staff that are really good with 12 and unders, and we have staff that’s really good with 13 and overs, and we have staff that’s just really good with everything.
So, that’s that’s that’s a glimpse into it.
And then of course you get the residential piece which is you know learning how to eat on your own and getting to bed at a reasonable time and and following the rules and being a good roommate which whether it’s getting ready for boarding school or just something to take back home to your own life with a little bit of autonomy and independence or again for some of our older kids getting a glimpse into what would college look like we try to make it a transformative experience.
I took my daughter when she was 13 or 14 and and it was it was fun.
I did the whole thing.
I did the whole camp experience.
I I sat in for all the talks, but I stayed in Swank and I think she I think my daughter stayed in Maine.
Okay.
And the two dorms if you’re So Swank Hall, Main Hall, is that correct?
Yeah.
Yep.
Okay.
And I and and I was struck by how much nicer everything was in my day.
I was like, whoa, they’ve really updated these.
These are beautiful.
Yeah.
And we’ve updated them since then, too.
Yeah.
It’s it’s it’s a it’s a gorgeous it’s a gorgeous gorgeous place.
All right, buddy.
It’s I I’ve held you for a long time.
I think you’re you’re rolling up on a on your neck meeting.
It’s uh it’s we have to find we have to find an excuse to talk again because I’ I enjoy it and I want to I love tracking your success and I’m very excited about next year.
Congratulations on Easter.
Do you have any parting thoughts?
No, I just again I I always appreciate the opportunity to come on and talk about about Mercersburg and you know I I threw out the word the phrase transformative experience that you used before and I I have found that sliding more into my lexicon on a daily basis or weekly basis and it I yeah I think the wrap here is that that this experience right the process it it can be transformative and it’s those relationships and the character that you build along the way that makes a difference and for me fortunately I’m able to do it here uh with a great group for people and get to talk about it with you which is cool too.
So appreciate the time as always Mel.
