NOT REALLY A FAREWELL TO SWIMMING
Hawks’ Beaudet has big plans in pool after state championships
Meghan Beaudet has modest goals for this week’s high school State Swimming and Diving Championships.
The Volcano Vista senior doesn’t picture herself leaving Albuquerque Academy’s natatorium with multiple gold medals — or even with one. She does want her final competitive meet to end on a high note.
“My goal is to make the top eight in my individual events,” said Beaudet, who will compete in the 200-yard individual medley and 100 freestyle. “I’ve always barely missed it. In my relays I just want to have my best times and help my team. That would be a really good ending.”
If it sounds like Beaudet is about to leave the pool behind, she’s not. Beaudet has signed a national letter of intent to play water polo at Arizona State beginning next season. That, she said, will amount to two dreams coming true at
once.
“Since childhood I’ve always loved Phoenix,” Beaudet said. “I have family there. So getting a scholarship to play water polo at Arizona State, that’s as good as it gets.”
College water polo may be the culmination of Beaudet’s athletic journey, but competitive swimming provided her path. It started when she was 8 years old and accompanied by mother, Kathy, and older sister, Kaitlyn, to Albuquerque’s Sierra Vista Pool and Tennis Courts. Kaitlyn took to tennis; Meghan did not.
“I hated tennis,” she said, “but I had such a great time swimming and I ended up winning races. I won some first places at the city championships in my age group (8-and-under) and was the overall winner. After that we decided I’d try club.” That worked out well, too. “She swam for Duke City Aquatics and was one of the top swimmers in the state for several years,” said Kathy, who has coached her daughter at Volcano Vista for the last four years. “But the first time Meghan saw water polo, that was what she wanted to do. She fell in love with it.”
Beaudet did not get off to such a fast start in water polo. Her club coach, Janet Lyon-Huffman, was reluctant to let the 10-year-old swimmer try the physical sport.
“She was too small,” Kathy recalled. “She came home crying and said, ‘Janet won’t let me play.’”
Gradually Huffman relented, Meghan Beaudet said with a chuckle.
“At first she let us play water polo with two broomsticks as a goal,” she said. “After a while I got to play twice a week with the bigger kids. I got pushed under water a lot.”
A steady diet of pool water did nothing to dissuade Beaudet from her newfound sport. At age 11 she played in her first water polo travel tournament with Duke City Aquatics and met Sandy Nitta, a former Olympic swimmer who later coached national water polo teams in Brazil and the United States. Nitta, a Water Polo Hall of Fame inductee, also directs Team Vegas/Henderson Water Polo, a Junior Olympic program which Beaudet later joined.
Success followed. Beaudet played goalie and was part of a national 12-under age group championship. She was named MVP of her Duke City Aquatics club team five times and later joined the sport’s Olympic Development Program.
Beaudet excelled to the point she was invited to try out for her national age-group team. She was among the final players cut but capitalized on the situation.
“It was humbling not to make it but it was a learning experience,” Beaudet said. “I played with elite-level athletes and a lot of college coaches saw me play.”
Among them was Arizona State coach Todd Clapper, who had little choice but to notice Beaudet.
“I always made sure to warm up and practice right in front of him,” Beaudet said. “I made sure he saw me. Later I contacted him and he knew my name, so I guess it worked.”
Beaudet also was recruited by Michigan, Hawaii and UC San Diego but quickly committed to Arizona State when Clapper offered a scholarship package. Beaudet, who switched from goalie to center several seasons ago, can’t wait to test her skills at the college level.
“I love the physicality; I love the fight,” Beaudet said of water polo. “In swimming you don’t go into other lanes. You really just race against yourself. In water polo you grab, fight and let the best man win.”
At the insistence of her water polo coaches, Beaudet has continued to swim competitively through high school. She admits to having mixed feelings about leaving the sport after this weekend’s state meet. Among other reasons, Beaudet’s swimming career drew her mother into competing, officiating and ultimately coaching. Kathy did not swim competitively growing up.
“It’s funny because I keep saying I can’t wait for it to be over,” Beaudet said, “but I’ve been swimming competitively for almost 10 years, and it’s been a huge part of my life. I’m looking forward to this weekend, but I think it’s going to be kind of emotional. I really hope it goes well.”