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NEWS, NOTES &
COMMENTARY
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The Bradsher Beat
Wednesday, November 9,
2011
By Bethany Bradsher |
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Each day a new adventure for
veteran coach
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Rick Kobe |
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(ECU SID image) |
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Conference USA
Football Standings |
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(Through games of 11.05.11) |
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East
Division |
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SCHOOL |
C-USA |
ALL |
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USM
ECU
Marshall
UCF
Memphis
UAB |
4-1
3-2
3-2
2-3
1-4
1-5 |
8-1
4-5
4-5
4-5
2-7
1-8 |
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West
Division |
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SCHOOL |
C-USA |
ALL |
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Houston
Tulsa
SMU
Rice
UTEP
Tulane |
5-0
5-0
4-2
2-4
1-4
1-5 |
9-0
6-3
6-3
3-6
4-5
2-8 |
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By
Bethany Bradsher
©2011 Bonesville.net
All rights reserved.
You could say that Rick Kobe has the longest
tenure of any East Carolina coach, and that would be true. But it would also
be a major understatement.
The fact is that Kobe is starting his 30th
season at the helm of the Pirate swimming and diving program, and the next
most senior coach, women’s tennis head coach Tom Morris, is in his 13th
year.
So how does a coach who has more than doubled
the longest stay of anyone else around him find a fresh perspective for each
new season?
The answer, Kobe says, lies in more numbers:
60 athletes, from 11 states and six foreign countries, competing in more
than 20 different events. That equation adds up to the secret of sustained
job satisfaction for Kobe — plenty of variety.
“Every day is different,” he said. “No day is
the same. And I like the potential of unexpected things.”
The 2011-12 Pirates, with five meets behind
them, have already provided some glimpses of the unexpected. Even with
losses to N.C. State and North Carolina, the teams have built a solid
foundation heading into their preparation for their biggest meet of the fall
— the Nike Cup in Chapel Hill.
The women’s team is 3-2 and the men’s team is
2-2, and they will swim a home dual meet against Catawba before the trip to
the Nike Cup next week.
“This meet will be our first big test,” said
senior captain Jonathan Bailey, a distance freestyler who earned
All-Conference USA honors last season. The Nike Cup features a field of
eight teams, including Navy, South Carolina and Duke.
Kobe fully expects the Pirates to swim some of
their best times at the meet, and the early part of the season indicates
that some of the strongest momentum will come from newcomers. Unlike some
other collegiate sports, swimming expects freshmen to come in and contribute
right away, and the coaches recruit accordingly.
“It’s a really, really strong class,” he said.
“Obviously, you want your kids to get better every year, but if you can
bring freshmen in who are potentially or who are already your top kids, that
helps. They come in young and hungry and ready to roll.”
“We have some really fast freshmen, which is
always good for the future of the team,” Bailey said.
One of those outstanding young swimmers is
Megan Rossi, a freshman who set a new ECU record for the 1,000-yard
freestyle against North Carolina with a time of 10:09.66. It wasn’t quite
Rossi’s fastest career finish in that event, Rossi said, but the fact that
she swam that fast so early in the season reflects the intensity of ECU’s
preseason training and the potential for her to topple more marks before the
season ends.
Expectations are also high for several of
ECU’s international swimmers, Kobe said, especially because coaches don’t
recruit out of the country unless they find individuals who can really have
an impact on their program.
Some of the biggest difference makers so far
have been sophomore Attila Kiraly from Hungary, who made the NCAA ‘B’ cuts
in three events last season and finished the 400 IM against North Carolina
in 3:59.96, almost six seconds in front of the second-place swimmer.
Freshman Rokas Cepulis from Sweden has notched four first-place finishes so
far this season in breaststroke and IM events.
On the women’s side, Natalia Favoreto, a
senior from Brazil, has finished first place in three events so far, twice
in the 50 free, the race in which she made the NCAA ‘B’ cut last year.
Add to those accomplishments the fact that
both swim teams consistently rank among the highest in the nation
academically, and it’s no wonder that Kobe would devote three decades to
leading Pirate swimmers.
“We’ve got a bunch of smart kids who like to
train hard,” Kobe said. “It just seems to get healthier and healthier every
year.”
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