The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Destiney finds her path to greatness
NEW HAVEN — Bill Sutherland first saw the possibilities in her shot put. Some bodies, some minds work best in a linear fashion. And others, well, they take the circular route to greatness.
Destiney’s destiny would be the latter.
“Coach Bill calls me a rotational athlete,” Destiney Coward said.
The Southern Connecticut State senior won the Division II indoor track national championship in the weight throw in March, and she is the favorite to win the hammer throw in the D-II outdoor nationals next week in Charlotte, N.C. Coward doesn’t only want the national title. She wants the national D-II record.
Is it possible? “Oh, yeah,” she said. Coward didn’t start competing in the shot put and discus until her junior year at East Haven High. Yet six years later, here she was Thursday 20 minutes from home and on the cusp of becoming an elite national performer at any level.
It was East Haven coach Jeff Cretella, an All-American shot putter coached by Sutherland at Southern, who first broached the subject of the hammer in college.
“I hadn’t seen it, didn’t know what it was,” Coward said. “(Cretella) told me I was going to do it and I said, ‘Oh, no.’ He showed me a little video. I still said, ‘Oh no, I’m a shot and discus person.’ ”
During that summer before her freshman year, Coward was training and Sutherland, the long-time throwing coach at Southern, showed her the hammer, let her grab it. And it was love at first touch, right?
“I hated it,” Coward said. “The shot put is get to the back and throw. The hammer is complex. There’s a lot more thinking involved.”
Sutherland has coached two Olympians, Anna Mahon and Bethany Hart. He knows his stuff.
The answer was in the geometry.
“Traditionally, the shot put is a very linear sport, A to B, from the back of the circle to the front for a glider, and she was a glider,” Sutherland said. “At the very end of her put she put in this rotational twist, which is not the best thing for the shot. But it was interesting.”
“Coach Bill said he noticed I come off on the side and do like a whip,” Coward said.
Don’t get this wrong. Coward had potential from the start. She won the CIAC Class M shot title. She won the State Open title. She was third in New England and 12th in the national meet.
“It’s funny, Jeff was always really square against the shot when he hit it, where Destiney was kind of going by it, waving at it,” Sutherland said. “Still, that rotary motion had possibilities elsewhere.”
Coward still gives Southern important meet points in the shot. Although she doesn’t really practice it much, Coward is ranked 23rd nationally and will do it next week in Charlotte.
“But if she wanted to be an elite athlete …” Sutherland said.
Coward, a chemistry major, laughs. One turn, two turns, four turns.
“I still think about the hammer way too much, but the passion definitely grew,” she said. “I’ve come to like the ability to go really fast and know the technique is working.
“I’m looking forward to throwing a lot farther in the nationals than I have this entire season. My practices have been going great. The goal is 70 meters. And after that the world is my oyster.”
Coward threw 66-23 (217-3 feet) at the Northeast-10 meet. Michaela Dendinger is second nationally in D-II at 62-7 meters. As a matter of comparison, Coward would be ranked eighth in Division I. So she is favored in Charlotte, but not satisfied.
“Never satisfied,” Coward said. “I want the national record of 69-33. Just a little more power and a lot more technique and the ball will move like it never has before.”
Her brother Niam plays for the Central Connecticut football team. There are athletic family genes. There also is the burning desire to excel. Take her indoor national title.
“I wasn’t so happy about it,” Coward said. “My goal was to break the record there. I’d thrown it so many times in practice, it just had to translate into the meet. Coach goes, ‘Look, you’re a national champion, you’ve got to be happy about that.’ People were saying the same thing. I’m like, ‘No, I’ve got to keep beating myself every time.’ If I don’t, I feel like I’ll get stuck. I don’t want to bask in it. I’m never satisfied. That’s how you get better.”
Coward smiles. She decides winning the national title was OK.
“Her academics were insane at that moment and she also was sick (with severe bronchitis), high fever, it was terrible,” Sutherland said. “She was on antibiotics for quite a while and that can mess up your system as an athlete.
“She just got wiped out.” Coward?
“She was doing some heroic things,” Sutherland said. “But she knows what she is capable of doing and that’s why she walked away disappointed. There’s also life after track.”
Academics are vital to Coward. She is majoring in chemistry with a pre-med concentration and a minor in computer science. She picked Southern over St. John’s. Both had chemistry. Southern had Sutherland. She only needs a few more credits and will finish her degree next spring.
“There’s med school afterward,” Coward said. “My goal is also to be Coach Bill’s third Olympian.”
Her season isn’t over after nationals. There are the USATF championships next month. The season could go until August. Looking to compete professionally, she’ll continue next year as she finishes her degree.
For now, she hunts the D-II record. The season’s best in the conference meet was not the best technically. In the New England meet she had two massive fourthrows. Great velocity, Sutherland said, but she was “a little dead in the legs” and put her hand down outside the circle.
“So the goal this week is to cool her jets a little, let her recover physically and mentally from finals,” Sutherland said.
“When he goes to meets, people always think of Coach Bill as very serious,” Coward said. “And it is very important to him. Yet at the same time, he wants you to have fun. He says he also needs to have fun with you. You can’t just be this grumpy old person coming into practice. There has to be a chemistry in a relationship. Off the bat, he approached me as kind, but if you’re willing to work hard he’s always there for you.”
After all these years, Bill Sutherland knows the road to greatness is not always a straight line.