Post by rainman on Apr 4, 2008 20:41:11 GMT -5
One of a Kind
By John Antonik for MSNsportsNET.com
April 2, 2008
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Kevin Donohue’s goal this year was to qualify for nationals and make top eight in either the 100 or 200 breast stroke. He felt reasonably confident that he could achieve that objective after getting a first-hand look at those events during his trip out to nationals last year swimming on West Virginia’s 200 medley relay team.
Donohue’s times were already comparable to the best breaststrokers in the country. The problem for him was getting in enough work this year to be ready for nationals.
Donohue has had a nomadic college career, first signing to swim with assistant coach Sergio Lopez at Northwestern and then leaving the Wildcat program when Lopez took the West Virginia job. Donohue went back to his hometown of Wakefield, R.I., and took a year off from collegiate swimming and competed with his club team while also taking some classes at the University of Rhode Island.
When Lopez called Donohue to see if he was interested in resuming his college career at WVU Donohue jumped at the opportunity. Kevin had no idea Lopez was going to leave him a second time before the start of his senior season.
“The first time I wasn’t as shocked because I knew he was such a great coach and coaches that good don’t spend a lot of time as assistants,” Donohue said. “That was something that I considered when I was actually looking at Northwestern.
“But it was kind of shocking (last) summer,” Donohue said. “I don’t think anyone saw it coming. It was rough. I had one year left and I wanted to make the best of it. I didn’t come here to swim for Vic (Riggs) but he ended up coming here and it eventually worked out great.”
But first things first. In order to swim for Riggs Donohue had to get eligible. Because of his transfers, Donohue fell one unit shy of his degree progression and he was unable to compete during the fall semester. An appeal was not granted by the NCAA so the earliest Donohue could get back into the pool competitively was Jan. 12 at Pitt.
“He was only eligible to train during the first semester,” said Riggs. “That whole process took two and a half months. During that time he had no idea he was going to be able to compete during the fall or not.”
The clock on Donohue’s college career was ticking and his margin of error for qualifying for nationals was narrowing. Instead of having at least two big meets to qualify for NCAAs in either the 100 or 200 breast, it came down to a meet at Pitt on Jan. 12, the Shamrock Invitational at Notre Dame on Jan. 25 and the Big East championships on Feb. 20.
That was the extent of Donohue’s senior season.
“He just came in everyday, trained like he was eligible, trained like he was going to be able to compete in our December meet down at the Georgia Invite and even though he wasn’t a captain, I would have to say he acted, trained and encouraged the team like one,” Riggs marveled.
Of course there were other obstacles that had to be dealt with beneath the surface. Riggs, a high-profile assistant coach at Georgia and USC, was coming into an unsettling situation at WVU. All of the kids on the men’s and women’s team were recruited to West Virginia by Lopez with the specific purpose of training under him. Naturally there was going to be attrition.
The end result was that just 12 kids were left on the men’s team. Even though many high-quality swimmers still remained, West Virginia simply did not have the numbers to score well in dual-meet races. And finishing fourth at the Big East Championships was a major accomplishment considering the size of the team.
“We had 11 or 12 swimmers on the guy’s side. A lot of the big schools have 40 or 50 guys on their roster,” Donohue said.
Riggs’ coaching style was also significantly different than Lopez’s.
“There was a pretty good difference from just what I’ve heard from the kids and from what I’ve heard of what he’s done in the past,” Riggs admitted. “The biggest thing I do with the kids and that I try and teach the kids is if you train and practice well at the pool, then the meets will take care of themselves.”
Donohue admits it took a while for Riggs to earn the trust of the swimmers that remained.
“The first part of the season was kind of a rough transition,” Donohue said. “We’ve got a new coach, new training style, and different type of workouts. It took a little while for everyone to get used to everything. All of the kids that were here were not kids that he recruited.
“After a couple of months most of the kids on the team kind of bought into what he was saying and what we were doing. The end result was we swam pretty well,” Donohue said.
Riggs had helped train elite swimmers at Georgia and USC and realized immediately that Donohue was in that class.
“I had a young kid when I was at USC who was a very good breast stroker also and got third (at NCAAs) his sophomore or junior year and Kevin started doing things comparable to what he was doing at SC,” Riggs said. “That’s when I kind of realized that we had a pretty decent shot of doing something at nationals in the 100.”
Donohue got his NCAA qualifying times at the Big East Championships, winning both the 100 and 200 breast and establishing conference records in both races.
Having already been to nationals Donohue knew what to expect. The biggest race at NCAAs isn’t the finals: it’s the qualifying heats that make up the preliminary rounds. Getting to the evening session is really the whole ballgame.
“In our sport other than Olympic Trials the NCAA men’s and women’s meet is the highest-pressured and fastest meet in the world,” Riggs said. “When kids get there if they’re not on then they’re not going to make it to finals.”
Donohue’s entire strategy was swimming as fast as he could during the morning heats.
“I had a pretty good idea how fast I needed to swim to be top eight. I figured it would be 53:1 or 53:2,” he said. “Also, during the race I was trying to beat as many people in my heat as I could. I think I got second in my heat in the morning and I actually went 53:1 in that race. There was only one heat after that so I knew I made it to finals and that was my whole goal going in.”
Reaching the finals means achieving All-America status. West Virginia’s best men’s finish ever at nationals was Kreg Lewis’ ninth-place finish in the 100 butterfly at the 1986 NCAAs in Indianapolis. No individual swimmer in school history has ever made it to the finals at NCAAs - that is until Kevin Donohue did it this year. Donohue wound up placing fifth.
Only last year’s WVU 200 free relay team (seventh place finish) had ever made it to the finals. What Donohue did last weekend at the University of Washington’s King Aquatic Center was a major, major accomplishment for the Mountaineer swimming program.
“I’m very proud of that and I was kind of surprised when I was told (no other individual had ever reached the NCAA finals) because I thought someone had done it in the early 80s,” Donohue said. “They looked into it and he finished ninth so that is kind of cool. I’m proud of that.”
Riggs says Donohue’s performance was a big boost to the WVU program and helps create the foundation for the program he intends to build.
“Having Kevin place top eight in the 100 breast is going to be good for the future of the program,” Riggs said.
For his part, Donohue says his performance at nationals has forced him to rethink his career in swimming. While making the U.S. team for the 2008 Summer Olympics is a stretch, competing internationally is not.
“Hopefully I’ll be able to swim for the U.S. in some international meets next year,” he said.
Riggs is going to continue to support Donohue’s career.
“Even before all this started I asked him, ‘What are you thinking about doing after you are done swimming?’ He’s like, ‘I’m not really sure.’ I told him that there were going to be a lot of people retiring after Trials and there are some good trips coming up,” Riggs said. “He’s going to continue to train and he’s going to be our volunteer assistant next year. We’re real excited about that.”
In the short time he’s competed at WVU Kevin Donohue has done as much as anyone to help stabilize the program. Now as a volunteer coach, Donohue can help Vic Riggs begin down the path of building something very special.
