OnFocus Season Preview
Coaching staff:
New head Coach-Kristin Felts-was the assistant coach for the last 5 years to former coach Nathali Jones
New Assistant Coach-Tayla Palascio-coming up from coaching the middle school as an assistant
Key returners:
Ava Etheridge-12
Madelyn Johnson-12
Leaira Poteat-12
Anna Price-12
Liz Weiland-12
Carol Korte -12
Lola Feit-11
Rainey Kissinger-11
Kendra Schleisner-11
Elisabeth Wettern-11
Emma Bessent-10
Elyxa Peck-10
Kenzie Schultz-10
All these girls have been with me as an assistant, so they know myself and my personality, many of them also took advantage of the summer swim camp that was instructed by Tayla Palascio our assistant coach
Key newcomers:
Rylee Reetz-11
Kyree McMahon-9
Willow Lee-9
Morgan Lee-9
Lilly Reetz-9
Kasia Jestadt-9
Alaina Bloczynski-9
Megan Schiferl-9
Alana Schroder-9
Caitlyn Mendrzycki-9
Conference outlook:
I would love for our team to win it all, but under a new coaching staff, and getting used to where all the girls strengths are, I much prefer for all the girls to beat themselves an achieve a PR in conference, make memories, and just have fun.
Keys to your success this season:
My motto to them is Swimming is 90% fun and 10% work. I will make it fun but you have to do the work. If you don’t do the work then we have to change it to 90% work and 10% fun. So far we’ve done the work with no issues.
Also change, we have a lot of change so far this season, we have 9 freshman coming in, but we also have 7 seniors exiting after this season, so we really need to work together and get the underclassman strong and fast so when our seniors are gone we won’t feel the hit to hard other than myself missing their smiling faces, and interesting/amazing personalities.
Behind the scenes: Who are some of the people that help your program succeed?
Our Athletic department, Chris Feidt, Scout Gerndt, and Becca Austin, as their own department has had change themselves, they have definitely help me with the transition from assistant coach to head coach, and are assisting me with any question or concern that I may have as season starts/progresses. In addition to that, I must give credit and thanks to Matt Peters and Phil Bickelhaupt, they are the individuals who help run the meets with our timing system, and meet manager system. They have both offered to help me with any questions or instruction I may need while learning the computer systems needed to send in lineups, and keep our home meets/invitationals running smoothly. Also, the team managers Aliyah Tafoya, Luke O’Connor, David Lee, and Lydia Zacher, Lydia is a diver but is currently recovering from an ACL repair and is unfortunately out for the season. These four individual you will see assisting in multiple ways, helping time, taking photos, cleaning up and organizing the equipment, filling water bottles etc., if it wouldn’t be for them I’m not sure I’d be able to get everything done.
Coach’s comments: anything else you’d like to share?
I’m sure there will be failure but to me fail means first attempt in learning. So with every failure there will be success and I intend to help the girls focus on the success/positive instead of the fail/negative.
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Author: David Keech
David Keech is a retired teacher and works as a sportswriter, sports official and as an educational consultant. He has reported on amateur sports since 2011, known as 'KeechDaVoice.' David can be reached at [email protected]
