Making A Splash
North Allegheny swimmers advance long history of competitive success.
BY JENNIFER BROZAK
When the North Allegheny swim team formed back in the early 1960s, the high school didn’ t even have a pool— and girls’ swimming hadn’ t yet been recognized as a WPIAL sport.
It’ s safe to say that the team has come a long way since those early days. Now recognized as one of the most competitive teams in western Pennsylvania, the team has amassed an impressive collection of championships and broken records, including eight consecutive WPIAL wins for the girls’ team and five consecutive wins for the boys.
The team’ s triumphant history is the result of consistency from both athletes and coaching staff, says head coach Patrick Wenzel, 41.
“ A lot of our success has to do with the development of young athletes who are coming into the program,” says Wenzel, who also serves as the head coach of the Allegheny North Swim Club.“ Some of our swimmers start with us as young as 7 years old, and by the time they get to us in high school and start competing, they’ re already familiar with what we do and how we do it.”
Wenzel has served as the team’ s head coach for the past four years, but has been with the program since 2002, when he worked under head coach Kirk“ Corky” Semler.
North Allegheny Swim Team circa 1963.
Semler led the swim team through many of its winning seasons, retiring in 2013 after 35 years. He started coaching the boys’ swim team in 1978, and also served as the assistant girls coach during the 1978 season. In 1979, he took over as head coach of both teams. Over the course of his career, Semler’ s combined record for the boys’ and girls’ teams was 632-83-6, and he coached his team to a myriad of championship wins, including 61 sectional, 26 WPIAL, 16 WPIAL runner-up, 9 PIAA and 7 PIAA runner-up titles.
“ I inherited a good team with talented swimmers, so the base was already there,” says Semler, 63.“ We’ ve always had a strong program, but especially in the last dozen years, Patrick [ Wenzel ] has built that team into the strongest age group program in western PA, which has fed the high school team some really good swimmers, mainly contributing to our current run of success.”
The team’ s successes date back at least as far as the early‘ 60s, says Semler; hanging in the pool office is a photo of 11 boys who competed in the 1963 WPIAL championships. The girls’ team won their first WPIAL title in 1973, the same year the team was established at North Allegheny, and the first year that the WPIAL recognized girls swimming as a sport.
One of those original girls’ team members was Janis( Hape) Dowd, who remains the only North Allegheny swimmer to
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