Baseball trio makes splash in swimming program

COSHOCTON - The Coshocton High School swimming pool is decorated with Coshocton spirit in mind.

It's painted red, white and black. "Coshocton Pride" is painted in red on the far wall with a portrait of a swimmer.

The Coshocton school records hang to the left of the scoreboard, and the senior photos hang to the right.

But the River View swim team shares the pool. The Black Bears use it to practice at night, and they host their home meets there. On Jan. 28, they were honoring their seniors. Josh Bigrigg, Jonathan Helmick and Bryar Cox were among eight of the seniors being honored.

They were decked out in their River View swimming warm-ups, but no shoes. They shook hands with Athletic Director Rod Lindsey, greeted each of their teammates and hugged their tearful coach, Kristina King.

Two years ago, the thought of being honored on senior night for swimming would have never crossed the three best friends' minds.

They are baseball guys to their cores. They are key parts of the defending East Central Ohio League Gray Division champion Black Bears' baseball team, and they will be again in March. But before that, they have to finish their winter sport.

Swimming, a sport that in many schools would usually go by the wayside, is in the spotlight thanks to the three of them.

Baseball players such as Adam Croup and Cole Bennett have joined the team, the number of young male River View swimmers has gone up in the Rising Tide program, according to King, and the Black Bears' boys program has become more competitive as a whole. And while it may not have started with them, they are carrying the torch.

"Swimming isn’t a well-known sport to everybody, and not everybody knows that much about it. But baseball players coming in and swimming really opens it up," teammate Nate Cooper said.

But before you can acknowledge the influence the three seniors have had on the program in just two years, you have to know where it all began.

It started  in the seventh grade on a football field. That's where the three guys, now known to King as the "baseball boys" or "Three Musketeers," became not just best friends, but brothers.

While their influence is a byproduct of their friendship, the primary reason King, their teammates and others think they have helped changed the culture is because of their influence at the high school.

Each of them is a National Honor Society student. Bigrigg has a 3.45 GPA, Helmick has a 3.48 and Cox holds a 4.3. But it's even more than their grades; it's the fact that on Friday nights, they are likely found in the front row, cheering on their teammates in any sport. They go to everything.

"These guys are very well known kids. For them to come into swimming, it opened it up," Cooper said.

But at the beginning, swimming wasn't easy for the "baseball boys." In the first practice, they couldn't make it down the length of the pool. Bigrigg was doing what he calls "belly smackers," and Helmick didn't want to put his head underwater.

It was bad by all accounts.

"I think we all thought we could swim to keep afloat, but not like that," Bigrigg said with a smile on his face.

For Cooper, the first day was comical.

"It was funny. I mean baseball players coming in to do swimming, out of all sports. It was just funny. But I just loved to see how they have progressed," he said.

But before they progressed, it got worse. The three of them weren't ready for the number of meters they would be doing or the stress it would put on their joints.

It got to the point where Helmick thought about quitting.

"I just wanted to be in the batting cages. I didn’t want to be at swim practice. I wanted to lift weights and go out and do stuff. You can’t do as much stuff as the other kids could because you had to come to practice every night late," he said.

King said she was worried Helmick would not return to the team after the holiday break.

"Yes, the first couple months, being sick, tired, sore, that weighed on them. When we hit the Christmas hump, I wasn’t sure if Jonathan (Helmick) was going to come back out," she said.

But when it came down to it, the three of them were in it together. They weren't letting one person fall by the wayside.

"We all had our moments of being frustrated, but I think it made us better in the long run," Bigrigg said.

Cox said: "We tried to stay positive and keep everybody together instead of letting one person fall out."

And on Jan. 17, 2014 — the day after the ECOL championships — they realized all the red bellies, soreness and late practices paid off.

It was the Northridge Invitational, and while they don't remember what they placed in the event, they do know that afterward, they were ranked in the district.

And that lit a fire for the competitive trio.

"We never paid attention to the rankings or anything, and then after (Northridge), we were ranked top 30 in the district. We knew we had a chance to go," Cox said. "Once we realized we were doing pretty well, it made it better because we were working toward a goal rather than just doing it."

With three meets left before the sectional meet, the three continued to improve and qualified for the district meet, placing 21st in the 400 freestyle relay with Caleb Fischer.

"It’s hard to explain that," King said trying of her emotions that day. "It gave me confidence that we could do something for this program. To go from where they were in two months, I’ve not seen kids more proud of their accomplishments."

Bigrigg said: "To get that patch was something special and big. I hadn’t got one before."

Then baseball season started. People saw the success and how in shape they were. Teammates began asking about swimming.

"A lot of kids had a lot more interest in it. Seeing that you can go out and be successful in something when you haven’t ever tried it before kind of spreads among the kids," Bigrigg said.

Baseball season passed, but they weren't sure they would go back to swimming.

"We all thought it was going to be just like last year that we would have to start all over again. But after the first practice, we knew we were going to be better off," Helmick said.

There were no belly flops the second time around. Instead, the first practice was like they never left the pool. King said they began the season just under their district times.

Then they got a new relay partner. Enter junior Nate Cooper, a natural swimmer, who jumped in on their 4x100 relay.

"Nate never hesitated once to say, ‘No I don’t want them on my relay,' or anything like that. He just took us in," Cox said.

Cooper said: "To have them come up and work as hard as they did has made my experience even better."

With the addition of Cooper's natural swimming ability and the athleticism of Helmick, Bigrigg and Cox, they have high goals for their 200 free relay entering Friday's sectional meet.

They want to be standing on the podium when the district meet ends, but they also want to make it to state. For once, baseball isn't the primary thing on their mind.

And that's OK.

On Jan. 28, the three of them stood together in front of a large crowd, and they weren't thinking about the belly smacking or quitting. They weren't thinking about what their times needed to be to make it to state. They were thinking about the mark they want to leave on the swimming program.

"Hopefully we are leaving a pretty good legacy for the younger kids to see that we’ve progressed in our two years to know that they can progress in their four years," Cox said.

"Coaches can make it to state, they can go here and there," King said. "I’ve been to state as a player and a coach, but senior night especially with a group like this is great because it’s ending another chapter, and they are going to start on adult life. And they are going to be OK."

cteaguerob@gannett.com

740-295-3442

Twitter: @cj_teague