Senior Matthew Cotter is the self-proclaimed slowest swimmer on the Seaholm swim team.
Few would ever openly make this claim. Most would be embarrassed by being the slowest, least skilled, or ‘weakest link’ on their sports team.
Cotter, on the other hand, has absolutely no problem with being the slowest on the team.
That’s because when he joined the team his sophomore year, he did not know how to swim.
“I asked Coach [Seaholm Head Coach Tom] Wyllie if I could join the team, and he said ‘as long as you know how to swim, you can join’,” said Cotter. “I said okay, not really knowing if he was joking or not.”
So Cotter walked to the edge of the pool, lowered himself into the water, and waded to the deep end.
He then proceeded to sink to the bottom like a cinder block.
“I semidrowned,” said Cotter. “A few other kids in the pool had to help me to the side.”
But despite the initial embarrassment, Cotter simply refused to give up.
It was at this point Wyllie realized Cotter needed some serious help swimming. Wyllie paired Cotter up with Ted Howard, an older team member, to teach Cotter how to keep his head above water.
To his credit, Cotter said he wasn’t completely ignorant of the ways of the water.
"I sort of knew the doggie-paddle," Cotter said with a wry smile.
To put it in perspective, joining the swim team without knowing how to swim is akin to joining the cross country team knowing only how to crawl, or the debate team without knowing how to speak English.
Slowly but surely, Cotter learned how to swim. And though he certainly isn’t one of the fastest swimmers on the team, one could never accuse him of having a poor work ethic.
Watching Cotter today, it’s difficult to believe that he is only two years removed from not knowing how to swim. Though he is certainly not one of the strongest swimmers, it is clear that he belongs on the team.
“He constantly wants to improve,” Wyllie said. “He always knows where he’s at. He doesn’t need a coach to tell him to work harder; he does it on his own.”
His stroke isn’t the prettiest thing in the pool, but it gets him from one side to the other. The splashes his feet make as they propel him through the water are noticeably larger than most others in the pool, and his arms hit the water with a smack, less smoothly than his teammates’. But comparing him to kids who’ve been swimming since their parents got them swim lessons in 1st grade is less than fair.
“I think he’s come a long way,” assistant coach Monica Jones said. “Where before he couldn’t jump into a lane from the side of the pool, now he can hang with some of the other swimmers in the lanes.”
Though Cotter’s hard work hasn’t brought him a ton of success at meets, it has brought respect from his teammates and coaches.
“Last year, Matt won the Coaches Award,” Wyllie said. “That’s the award the team gives to the swimmer who best embodies and exemplifies the honor code created by the team a few years back.”
Two years after joining the swim team and learning how to swim, Cotter has some words of encouragement for people with inhibitions about trying something new.
“A lesson I have learned is this: just because you don’t know how to do something doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to do it. What’s the worst that can happen?” Cotter said, reflecting on his three years on the swim team. “If you just put in determination, you can’t go wrong.”
So, after two years of knowing how to swim, Cotter is still the slowest on the team. As opposed to many other athletes at Seaholm, success at his craft isn’t the most important thing for Cotter.
“I care more about the team than I do about my swim times. Not to say that I don’t care about my times, but I care about the team a whole lot more,” Cotter said. “If it weren’t for my swim teammates, I probably would have quit.”
Coach Wiley agrees that the team’s bonds are very, very strong.
“It’s true for each team year after year. Every member of the team deserves respect,” said Wiley. “Everybody is of equal value. Everyone brings something different to the pool. Some are great swimmers, some are hard workers, some have a great sense of humor, and so on. No one swimmer is more valuable than any other.”
Cotter feels so much a part of the tightly-knit swim team that he plans on visiting next year.
“I think coach Wyllie wants me to sing the National Anthem a few times next year, so I’ll probably be back,” Cotter said.
If the swim team had a ‘Fastest Swimmer Award’, Cotter would never have won it. He will never draw comparisons to Michael Phelps. And he probably won’t cross the English Channel. Cotter has no illusions about this, but always sees the positive in his time on the swim team.
“I’ve never won a race,” said Cotter. “But there have been some races where I haven’t finished last.”
