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Wednesday, March 30, 2022 — 11
“What’s next?”: Maggie MacNeil’s journey to Olympic gold and beyond
KATELYN TURNER
For The Daily
JULIANNE YOON/Daily
Maggie MacNeil won a gold medal at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
SportsMonday: Don’t judge Michigan at its highs,
judge it by its lows
Out of COVID’s shadow, Michigan
lacrosse has found its identity
LINDSAY BUDIN
Daily Sports Writer
KATE HUA/Daily
Now, out of the shadow of the pandemic, the women’s lacrosse team is
ready for a historic season.
The Olympics are the grand-
est stage in sports and the ultimate
dream of many athletes. For the very
driven and gifted few, that dream
becomes a goal.
Maggie MacNeil, a Canadian
native and senior on the Michigan
swimming and diving team, had the
Olympics as a backdrop from the very
beginning. Right after the 2008 Bei-
jing Games, an eight-year-old Mac-
Neil started her swimming career.
MacNeil’s passion arose from the
most raw aspect of the sport: her love
of the water. Her mother, a physi-
cian, emphasized water safety from a
young age, which spurred MacNeil’s
interest. But back then, she never
imagined swimming would carry her
to such heights.
“Whenever someone starts sports,
the Olympics are always a goal,” Mac-
Neil said. “But I didn’t think swim-
ming would take me this far.”
MacNeil initially realized the
exceptionalism of her talent in 2015
when she first joined Canada’s
Junior National Team at age fifteen.
Even after reaching that elite level,
she never acknowledged the Olym-
pics as a potential reality until 2019
at her first FINA World Champion-
ships.
MacNeil won the 100-meter but-
terfly, defeating Sweden’s Sarah Sjos-
trom—the 2016 Olympic champion
— and breaking the Americas’, Cana-
dian and Commonwealth records in
the process. As the world champion, it
began to sink in that she could qualify
for the Tokyo Olympics the following
year.
But in March 2020, all of Mac-
Neil’s plans were derailed. With the
NCAA Championships canceled, she
returned home to Canada, where she
was isolated from her teammates and
her regimented training schedule.
MacNeil went six months without a
regulation-size pool and was forced
to find other ways to stay in shape.
“None of us (swimmers) are great
at land sports,” MacNeil said. “Run-
ning is my enemy.”
To help her get any minimal feel
for the water during quarantine,
MacNeil’s parents opened their back-
yard pool at the end of March. While
it was nowhere near the 50-meter
Olympic-size pools, MacNeil trained
in the heated waters during the brisk
Canadian spring, even if it was merely
for ten minutes a day.
“Motivation was really hard,”
MacNeil said. “In retrospect, I prob-
ably should have done more than I
did.”
Her atypical training paid off
when she qualified for the resched-
uled Tokyo Games. But the 2021
Olympics were far from the typical
competitive atmosphere. No fans
were allowed at the natatorium, and
athletes were divided into quaran-
tine bubbles by country and sport.
But this being her first Olympics,
there was nothing for MacNeil to
compare the conditions to, so she
used that to her advantage.
One of the most impactful altera-
tions was changing the time of day
that the 100-meter butterfly finals
were swam. Rather than taking place
in the evening, the finals were held in
the morning, giving MacNeil no time
to overthink.
“I just woke up and knew I had a
job to do,” MacNeil said.
Entering the finals ranked No.
6, MacNeil was not deterred by her
seed. As long as there was a lane for
her, winning was still a possibility. At
the 50-meter turn, halfway through
the race, MacNeil’s split was not even
in the top three. But in the last 15
meters, MacNeil put her head down,
touching the wall in 55.59 seconds
to capture a new Americas record.
Winning gold made MacNeil the first
female Michigan swimmer to place
first individually at the Olympics
since 1964.
But earning gold was not the same
without her family present to cel-
ebrate with her. The endearing video
footage that MacNeil’s cousin sent to
her displaying her family’s reaction
and excitement was not nearly the
same as being in person. Instead she
celebrated with her Canadian team-
mates and also those she swam with
at Michigan.
Training for four years in Ann Ayr-
bor with those swimmers left strong
ties, with the collegiate season lasting
from early September to late March.
In between, from April through
August, MacNeil competes in the
international season.
And this is an annual occurrence,
not only during Olympic years.
Swimming is arguably the most
grueling
yet
underappreciated
sport in the world of athletics. Many
spectators tune in every four years
for the Olympics
and then neglect
swimming’s
rel-
evance after the
Games
conclude.
But for athletes
such as MacNeil,
the work never
stops.
“Swimming
is
not an easy sport,”
MacNeil said. “We
don’t have an off-
season.”
While she tries
to
take
two-to-
four weeks off in
between each col-
lege and interna-
tional season, the
training
drought
MacNeil
and
every other athlete
endured
during
quarantine
was
unlike any other.
But
despite
the
unorthodox condi-
tions, MacNeil and many others had
stellar performances as a result.
“I’m really grateful I was able to
succeed despite all the challenges,”
MacNeil said. “But it definitely
makes me reevaluate my plans going
into the next Olympics.”
Leading up to the 2020 Games,
MacNeil’s training was significantly
lighter than what it would have been
in a typical year. While practicing
with teammates is something that
is imperative, she is looking to adopt
some of the aspects that transpired
into a gold medal.
Going forward, MacNeil recently
announced her commitment to exer-
cise her final year of NCAA eligibil-
ity to compete at the University of
California Berkeley while pursuing a
master’s degree. After graduating in
2023, she will have complete control
over her training the year before the
2024 Olympics.
Although it seems as if MacNeil
just won Olympic gold, but the turn-
around is swift. With the 2020 Olym-
pics postponed a year, Paris is quickly
approaching. While MacNeil has her
eyes set on the 2024 Games, her focus
has not come without doubt.
“I’ve definitely questioned swim-
ming and goals because I feel like
I’ve done a lot of everything I’ve ever
wanted,” MacNeil said. “I felt lost in
the ‘What’s next?’”
MacNeil has decided to train for
Paris, but beyond that, she is not
tying herself to anything. Every ath-
lete’s career comes to an end at some
point, and she is going to determine
her future based on her happiness
and the satisfaction she derives from
swimming.
There could be a long professional
swimming career on the horizon, or
she may pivot into something else. No
matter what comes her way, MacNeil
is taking her training and her career
day by day.
“As long as I’m enjoying it, whatev-
er happens along the way will be icing
on the cake,” MacNeil said.
She has turned her dreams into
goals and her goals into reality. All
that is left is for MacNeil to answer
her own question: “What’s next?”
The implications of COVID
stretch far past health, and for the
Michigan women’s lacrosse team,
the
pandemic-inflicted
burden
hampered their 2021 season.
Being part of a team entails much
more than the product on the field.
Goals and assists may appear in the
boxscore, but without camaraderie
and trust, little production — and
subsequent winning — can occur
during games.
As someone who’s been around
the game of lacrosse all of her life,
first as a decorated player and now
as the Michigan coach, Hannah
Nielsen understands that better
than anyone.
“It’s about road trips and eating
together and being on the same bus,”
Nielsen said. “Just those little things
you have along the way. That’s how
you build relationships.”
In a year where student athletes
around the country lived in fear of
falling ill, sacrificed their social lives
and played in front of empty bleach-
ers, building strong connections
seemed inconceivable
Last year, despite having tal-
ented pieces, the blockage of any
normalcy proved too severe for the
Wolverines. They finished 3-9, con-
cluding their season with a demoral-
izing loss to Maryland in the Big Ten
Tournament.
Activities as basic as eating
meals together and spending time
as a group are often overlooked, but
without them, chemistry is unat-
tainable.
“We couldn’t (do) the little things
you do off the field,” Nielsen said.
“Wins and losses are great but
lacrosse and the collegiate-athlete
experience is so much more than
that.”
The team experienced firsthand
that the impacts of the pandemic ran
deep.
At a school that excels in athletics,
people often focus on the “athlete”
part in “student-athlete,” but first
and foremost, these players are stu-
dents. In late 2021, as the Omicron
variant soared and outlook on life
seemed grim, the expectations for
collegiate athletes to perform grew
even higher.
But with immense sacrifice and
little optimism, it’s difficult to live up
to the expectations.
With vaccinations in full effect
and the pandemic winding down,
normalcy was beginning to resur-
face. As the world inched closer to
equilibrium and the 2022 season
neared, many unanswered ques-
tions remained, the most glaring one
being:
What now?
The team could dwell on the pre-
vious season’s shortcomings or focus
on the future; the choice was obvi-
ous to them.
“It was ‘Hey guys, let’s forget
about it, it happened and we’re mov-
ing on,’ ” Nielsen said. “The girls
are motivated because 3-9 … wasn’t
really a true illustration of who we
are and what we could accomplish.”
The silver lining of the pan-
demic, though, was an extra year
of eligibility. The love of their team,
their school and their sport drove
fifth-year captains Caitlin Muir and
Arielle Weissman to exercise that
privilege.
“(Coming back) was never any-
thing that I thought about before
COVID happened,” Muir said. “But
with not getting to finish out my
years on my own terms, it was really
a done deal.”
As
COVID-induced
crutches
lifted and the team began to focus
on building relationships and nur-
turing talent, the players set out to
show that the driving force of the
abysmal 2021 season was the loom-
ing pandemic and not the players
themselves.
The Wolverines opened their sea-
son with seven straight wins — mak-
ing it clear to everybody what they
were capable of.
Leadership from seniors Erin
Garvey, Kaitlyn Mead and Morgan
Whitaker in addition to the two
fifth-years displays the potential
that the pandemic was covering in
the previous season.
“They’re doing a great job,”
Nielsen said. “It makes me want to
coach harder because of the effort
they’re putting in so that we can
reach our goals this year.”
If you’ve been following the
Michigan women’s basketball team
for the past couple of years, you
know how many history-making
moments it has had.
In 2017, the Wolverines won their
first WNIT Championship.
In 2021, then-junior for-
ward Naz Hillmon broke
the Michigan record – for
both the men’s and women’s
programs – with 50 points
in a single game, and the
Wolverines made their first
Sweet Sixteen appear-
ance.
This
season,
they
secured a No. 3 seed in the
NCAA Tournament — the
highest in program history.
Along the way, Michigan coach
Kim Barnes Arico has become the
first coach in program history to
lead the team to a top 10 ranking,
reaching as high as top five. The first
to surpass 200 wins with the pro-
gram. The only coach to have eight
20-win seasons.
On Monday, the Wolverines will
add another line to their list of firsts:
First Elite Eight appearance.
“Obviously we have made his-
tory throughout this entire season,
but we wanted to continue to keep
doing things that have never been
done before and go through the
highs and lows that we did this sea-
son,” senior guard Leigha Brown
said after Saturday’s win
against South Dakota. “ …
But we’re not done yet. We
want to keep making his-
tory.”
You can judge Michigan
by its extensive list of acco-
lades. But it’s even more
telling to look at what’s
not on its résumé.
It was less than two
months ago that a snow-
storm and a canceled
road game essentially lost Michi-
gan what would have been its first
Big Ten title. And it was less than a
month ago that No. 6 seed Nebraska
took the Wolverines by surprise
in the second round of the Big Ten
Tournament.
“That’s crushing and that can
be devastating and that can change
the outcome of the year, for sure,”
Barnes Arico said.
And, yet, it didn’t. Michigan took
to the court in the first round of
March Madness, seemingly unfazed
by its earlier challenges, and blew
out American, 74-39.
What’s not noted on the Wol-
verines’ stats sheet is senior guard
Amy Dilk’s injury that kept her out
of most conference games. And the
fact that they pulled off a 13-4 Big
Ten record even without one of their
biggest defensive assets.
It’s not just the record-breaking
moments, but the times they’ve been
tested that makes this team what it
is.
That combination of confidence
and resilience is tested more and
more as Michigan makes its way
through March. Even as their wins
have gotten progressively closer —
their first win by 35, their second by
15 and their most recent by just three
— the Wolverines have maintained
their composure.
“There were a lot of things that
happened during the course of the
year that we could have crumbled
and said ‘Well, woe is me’ and ‘Why
did this happen to us?’ ” Barnes
Arico said. “I’m sure alone in our
moments we do say that, but I think
the great quality about this team and
this program has been the ability to
get back up every day and to come
together and say, ‘Well, now we have
something to prove.’ ”
This dynamic is maybe best seen
in the ending of Saturday’s game.
After trailing by five points with less
than two minutes left, the Coyotes
managed to tie the game. In the final
minute with the team’s hopes on the
line, Barnes Arico’s message from
the sidelines encompassed all of the
confidence and resilience this sea-
son has built:
Just score.
“That right there, that gave me
the most confidence in the world,”
freshman guard Laila Phelia said.
“I felt like just being able to have the
head coach sit there and tell me to go
score and don’t hesitate at all, I felt
like that really helped a lot.”
You can judge the Wolverines by
the records they’ve broken and the
games that they’ve won, or you can
judge them by the number of times
they’ve fallen and had to get back
up. Either way, the conclusion is the
same:
Michigan is a force to be reckoned
with.
LANE
KIZZIAH
Paul Nasr: Quinnipiac’s early goaltender pull
saved Michigan’s season
ALLENTOWN,
Penn.
—
Despite entering the third period
with a 4-0 lead, the Michigan
hockey team still struggled to put
Quinnipiac away. The Wolverines
completely
collapsed
throughout
the
first
15 minutes of the final
frame.
And Bobcats coach
Rand Pecknold’s decision
to pull goaltender Dylan
St. Cyr with almost four
minutes left saved Michi-
gan’s season.
That’s not an indict-
ment on the Wolverines.
They manhandled Quin-
nipiac’s
nation-leading
defense
throughout
much of the contest. They earned
their place in the Frozen Four.
But the Bobcats could’ve taken
Michigan’s spot in Boston. Quin-
nipiac took over the game, seized
all the momentum and then freely
handed it right back to Michigan
on Pecknold’s baffling decision.
“It was a pretty normal decision
for how I operate,” Pecknold said
of pulling his goaltender while his
team was surging, having scored
three unanswered goals. “… Prob-
ably the last 13 (to) 14 years, we’ve
done that pretty regularly, getting
the goalie out early. … It works a
lot more than it doesn’t for us.”
As Pecknold made that state-
ment, celebratory music from
Michigan’s locker room blared
into the media room
while he spoke som-
berly. Clearly, pulling
the goalie worked for
the Wolverines, not his
own team. Michigan
is uber-talented, but
young and untested.
It’s a critique Michi-
gan coach Mel Pear-
son called out after
the game, but one
that made itself clear
throughout the third
period.
The
Wol-
verines have the talent to win a
national championship, but older
and more battle-tested teams
have an advantage in composure
and game management.
After the Bobcats scored their
three unanswered goals, they
continued to methodically des-
ecrate Michigan’s young, falter-
ing roster. Quinnipiac was calm
and poised, and with its regularly
dangerous attacks, it had a clear
blueprint to victory with plenty
of time.
That blueprint was thrown into
the Lehigh River when the goal-
tender was pulled, a saving grace
for Michigan’s young squad.
“We were reeling,” Pearson
said. “… They had us on the ropes.
It was an interesting time to pull
the goalie.”
Interesting indeed.
Halving almost four minutes
left wasn’t the only shocking
thing about the goaltender being
pulled, it was the on-ice context as
well. Instead of at least pulling the
goalie while his team controlled
possession in its offensive zone,
Pecknold ordered St. Cyr to the
bench before a faceoff, where the
puck’s possession was in question.
Who does that?
The Wolverines could very
well have won that faceoff and
launched the puck into the empty
net right then and there. Pecknold
added extra strain to his decision
by betting on his team to win the
faceoff too. Although the Bobcats
won the draw, sophomore for-
ward Thomas Bordeleau quickly
challenged and stole the puck.
He then raced down the ice,
passing it across to wide open
fifth year senior Michael Pastujov
for the empty-net goal that essen-
tially sealed the game with over
three and a half minutes left.
“They had all the momentum,
and there’s like four minutes left
in the game,” Pearson said. “I’m
not going to question any coach.
… (Pecknold’s) been around a
long time, ton of respect for him
… (but) they were pushing, they
didn’t need to pull the goalie, they
were all over us.”
With 22 seconds left in the
game, defenseman Zach Metsa
removed any room for debate,
scoring Quinnipiac’s fourth goal
on even strength. Had the Bobcats
left their goaltender in, the fourth
goal could have very well tied the
game, giving Quinnipiac all the
momentum entering overtime.
When asked if he regrets pull-
ing his goaltender so early in
hindsight, Pecknold’s answer
was blunt:
“No.”
Michigan certainly doesn’t
regret it either. It was a team
sliding into an embarrassing
loss, and its opponent saved it
from demise. By pulling his goal-
tender with almost four minutes
left as his team was surging,
Pecknold threw the Wolverines
a life raft.
A raft that will carry Michi-
gan to Boston for the Frozen
Four.
PAUL
NASR
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