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Marlington program making waves behind coach who found the pool after losing his wife

Canton Repository - 2/16/2021

Make the best of a bad situation. Or any situation.

Bruce Maher developed 20-20 vision in seeing life that way.

One of his heroes is a blind person who swims in Special Olympics. Try to imagine doing that, he tells the Marlington High School athletes he coaches.

His winding lane to the pool traces to rough waters.

Maher and his high school sweetheart, Cindy, were in a busy part of life, in their late 30s and raising three children. She was diagnosed with a cancer that took her when she was 41.

Twenty years have passed. He is 61 years old, still mindful of her parting words when she barely had the strength to speak.

"She told me she loved me," he said. "She said, 'Never give up. Fight, fight, fight.'"

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He fought for their children. He learned how to be a widower father of three. They are grown now.

The oldest is Josh, 31, a surviving twin whose brother, Jacob, died at birth. Josh was a valedictorian at Salem High School. He is a public records and data analyst at Ohio State University.

The youngest, Mallory, is an athlete and a coach. She is 26 years old and working at Hathaway Brown School.

The middle child, Isaiah, drew Bruce into swimming. Isaiah was diagnosed when young with what his father describes as high-functioning autism. Isaiah became a competitive Special Olympics swimmer. He works a job for Gordon Brothers Water Treatment Systems, and he swims.

Bruce grew up not knowing a competitive pool from a hole in the ground. He was a 5-foot-9 basketball guard and baseball player at Salem who went on to play college basketball at Thiel.

Bruce found he liked everything about swimming after Isaiah got going. He became a familiar face in the swim community. Five years ago, he caught wind that Marlington would launch a full-fledged OHSAA swim team.

When he applied for the head coaching job, they told him six students were interested. Not long after he got the job, 18 signed up. The last couple of years, the team number has been around 30.

It helped that a Marlington student, Baila Bugara, made a name as an age-group swimmer, competing outside the school-team sphere.

"Baila kind of put us on the map," Maher said. "She's like the first lady of Marlington swimming."

Maher valued advice from experienced coaches, including Mike Davidson of the Canton City Schools (CCS) competitive team, Alliance High School head coach Marikay Kuntzman, longtime Alliance coach Mike Bugara, and Kristen Reynolds.

He adopts their pet sayings, such as Kuntzman's, "It takes a village." The village rejoiced at last Friday's Division II sectional meet in Wooster. Marlington outscored the rest of the 25-team field and will send a large contingent to this Friday's district meet in Geneva.

Baila Bugara, sophomore Claire Cox and freshman Leah Guess led the way. Among the three of them, Marlington has at least one swimmer in Stark County's top 10 in every individual event.

"Sectionals were awesome," Bugara said. "We were 10th when I was a freshman and fourth last year, and now we're first. Our girls team is undefeated this year. Everyone is so dedicated.

"This has been a strange season when we didn't even know if we were going to have a season. We've gotten this far, and now we just need to go out and have fun."

Fast is fun. The Dukes are swimming with the sharks from Hoover and Jackson. Mix in senior freestyler Olivia Ryan, and they rank second in Stark County behind Hoover in all three relays.

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Other Dukes advancing to districts are Savanna Richards, Kylie Tolerton, Megan Montgomery and Ashley Tarter.

"You're not supposed to get goosebumps at my age," Maher said, "but the sectional meet gave me goosebumps."

The coach is having fun. Lots of it. He delights in greeting a swimmer who climbed out of the pool well outside the lead pack but fresh off a personal best.

"That kid feels like a conquering hero," he said. "That's swimming. It's such a good sport, mentally, spiritually and physically."

Life as a swim coach represents a new phase in Maher's life. At the end of certain days, he literally looks himself in the mirror, advancing the same question he began to ask after he lost his wife.

"How did we do today?"

Reach Steve at steve.doerschuk@cantonrep.com

On Twitter: @sdoerschukREP

This article originally appeared on The Repository: Marlington program making waves behind coach who found the pool after losing his wife

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