Swimming develops at Mooney High

Supported by parents and the school, the team has grown to 10 members.

By JOE SCALZO

VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF

YOUNGSTOWN — Three years ago, freshman Tom Boniface could have walked up to a swimmer at another school and introduced himself as “the Mooney High swimming team.”

“He was the only one we had,” said his father, Tom Boniface.

So the elder Boniface approached Mooney principal Jane Marie Kudlacz about starting a team. She told him if they could find a coach, the school would love to support it.

“They wanted to have more diverse opportunities than just football, basketball and baseball,” said Boniface.

So Boniface got his coaching certificate, got some parents involved and, the next season, he had four kids. Then six. Then, this year, he fielded a team of 10, good enough to compete in high school meets for the first time. Although the Cardinals aren’t yet good enough to compete with the area’s top programs like Boardman, Canfield and Poland, they’re competitive in most events. For Boniface, the quality of talent isn’t the problem. It’s the quantity.

“We’ve got some good swimmers up front,” said Boniface, who has two children on the team. “We swam a meet against Poland this year and won seven of the 11 events, but still lost the meet.

“The challenge at this point is to get more bodies.”

Mooney’s swimmers train with the YMCA’s Y-Neptunes during the season and compete against Boardman and Canfield in the Youngstown Swim League in the summer. The younger Boniface, now a senior, will swim at Division III Bates College in Maine next season, while senior Morgan McCarty has been accepted to the University of Chicago, one of the top Div. III swim programs in the nation.

“It’s hard to expand at a school like Mooney, where football is king,” said the elder Boniface. “But I’m a swimmer. I have a passion for it, like anything else. We have a parent-led organization and it’s all about the kids. These parents give their effort no reward other than to watch their child grow.

“That’s why swimming is such a neat sport. There’s no politics involved. You either made the time or you didn’t. When you take the politics out of sports, it becomes a lot of fun.”

scalzo@vindy.com