Maggie Singler Keenan, Columbia High School Class of 1997, was a champion swimmer in high school and she’s been bringing her winning ways to CHS as swim coach for the last 13 years.
Just this winter, Keenan reached her 100th meet win as CHS Girls Swim Team head coach. With the completion of the season — and the girls reaching the state sectional semifinals — Keenan’s win total for the girls is now 110.
But her record is actually better than that. Keenan has also recorded 73 wins with the CHS Boys Swim Team.
The season started off with a splash when Keenan achieved that 100th win with the girls in their first meet of the season against West Orange.
And it just got better from there.
The boys made it to the state sectional finals — Keenan says for the first time in modern history. Even though they didn’t win, Singler said, “We got there, which was amazing. We know where we want to go in the future, and we gave them a run. We had a great meet.”
RELATED: CHS Boys Swim Team Headed to State Sectional Finals for 1st Time in Over a Decade
“The girls made it to the semis and we gave Westfield a really great meet” as well, said Keenan. “That was a really big deal for the girls team to be in that meet and be competitive.”
The success of the teams stems from Keenan’s approach of excellence and competition — coupled with a no-cuts policy that has increased the size of the team and helped to foster interest and a sense of community.
“There’s really no requirements other than dedication —I mean, you have to be able to safely swim, but I have kids that are learning how to do strokes and flip turns,” said Keenan.
“And because we have such a big team, we have a lot of opportunities that the more novice kids can get chances to race if they want. I feel like it’s such a team dynamic despite that swimming isn’t necessarily a team sport in general,” said Keenan, “but we’ve kind of cultivated this culture with the swim team where everyone is a participant.”
“I do think that’s probably the reason that we continue to grow because it’s so welcoming — I love that — while being super competitive too,” said Keenan.
Since the CHS pool was shuttered in 2016, both the boys and girls swim teams have made the Union Boys and Girls Club their home (with a brief stint at Morristown Beard Academy), practicing from 8:30 to 10 p.m. and hosting home meets at that location.
“The commitment of the swimmers and their families is huge,” said Keenan. “But they love it. It’s so much fun. We get more and more kids every season.”
Keenan says that the town pool teams — the South Orange Dolphins and the Maplewood Makos “are really strong programs” serving as “really great feeder programs.”
Keenan also supports swim equity.
“I’m all about if we can make lessons affordable and open to give everybody a chance to learn to swim — it’s fun to be a competitive swimmer but it’s literally a life-saving skill that we should have for everybody.” She said she was sad that CHS couldn’t offer that anymore with the loss of the pool.
She feels that with the towns providing more “swim lessons for all” the CHS team will only grow stronger: “If kids could get into the sport at a much younger age, then who knows what they could be capable of.”
How do things look for next year’s CHS swim teams?
“This year there’ll be 24 seniors graduating, boys and girls together, which is the largest class by far. And many of them are swimmers that started when they were freshmen and just decided to try it and pick it up and now some of them are captains and have accomplished amazing things.” Keenan says the sophomore and junior classes are looking strong and “we have some freshmen that joined this year that are really impressive swimmers.”
A champion in her own right
Keenan heads up the CHS swim program while working full-time in another district on a child study team. She lives in the Maplewood home where she grew up, raising four sons with her husband. All the boys — a 4th grader, a 2nd grader and twins in kindergarten — go to school in the South Orange-Maplewood School District.
Before CHS, Keenan swam on the Maplewood town team, became a lifeguard at the Maplewood Community Pool at 14 and worked there for 19 years. As a teenager, she swam in the Junior Olympics, set records at CHS and won the 50 freestyle and 100 freestyle at the Essex County Championships three years in a row. She also won the 50 freestyle at the Iron Hills Championship three years running. She swam at Providence College (NCAA Division I, Big East Conference) and in masters’ leagues, coached the Maplewood Makos, and in 2011 was inducted into Columbia High School’s Athletic Hall of Fame.
“That’s one of things I’m personally super proud of is that I am in the CHS Athletic Hall of Fame,” said Keenan. “I was the first female swimmer inducted.”
Per a Matters magazine profile on Keenan published in Spring 2016, Keenan “was about 3 years old when she jumped off the steps of the Maplewood pool and happily swam around the shallow end on her own.”
Keenan told Matters, “People were always asking my mom, ‘When did she learn to swim?’ and my mom would say, “She’s always been like that. Always a swimmer.”
Those interested in joining the CHS swim team can contact Keenan at [email protected].
Follow the CHS Boys Swim Team on Instagram at chsboysswimming/
Photos by Anna Herbst.
