John Marcolina no longer technically swims for the Fitch/Stonington/Ledyard/Norwich Tech cooperative team, meaning Ken Berg no longer coaches him.

But Berg has some pretty meaningful words as Marcolina, a Fitch High School senior, departs.

"He's enthusiastic. He's built to do unbelievable things. He has the up side of everything he needs to continue and go fast," Berg said. "I wouldn't know what it would be like not to have him around. He never missed a practice. Was he sick? I don't know. He never missed a practice.

"He's my chicken. I hatched him. Let's see him be a rooster. I want to see him be a rooster."

Marcolina, all grown up, was named The Day's 2019 All-Area Swimmer of the Year, his third time earning that honor.

He earned Eastern Connecticut Conference Swimmer of the Meet honors after winning four events at the league championship, with the 100-yard butterfly (53.09 seconds), the 100 breaststroke (meet record 1:00.07), the 200 medley relay and the 400 freestyle relay.

He was the Class L state champion in the 100 freestyle (47.58) and runner-up in the 50 freestyle (21.58), also leading two relay teams to top-six finishes in that meet, and he was second in the 50 free at the State Open (21.34).

Marcolina gave a verbal commitment to swim beginning next season at Division III Bates College in Lewiston, Maine.

"After talking to coach (Peter) Casares, meeting all the new students, I knew that's where I was going to be," said Marcolina, who attended a day for admitted students at Bates earlier this month and texted Casares two days later to commit. "Just everything (I liked), coach Casares, the swim team, the goals for the swim team, the location — I love skiing and stuff like that. It's such a good feeling now, the feeling of knowing where I'm going.

"The whole recruiting process and everything that comes with senior year, it matured me."

Marcolina is constantly achieving new heights, first just with swimming at all. His mom gave him a choice when he was 6 or 7 years old, to read books while his older brother Daniel swam or to get in the water himself.

"I did not imagine myself being here when I was 6," Marcolina said.

Then, this season, Marcolina, with his powerful 6-foot-3, 190-pound frame, set out to become more polished in all the swimming strokes, not just stereotyping himself as a sprinter. He swam the 50 freestyle only twice during the season and the 100 once. He set the breaststroke record at the ECC meet, only then beginning his postseason bid in the sprints.

"I was reading a fitness book and it said you don't really want to specialize. It was about fitness, but that applies to swimming, too," Marcolina said. "I wanted to try to do all of them."

And finally, Marcolina surprised himself at the Class L meet March 11 at Southern Connecticut State University. He had a poor turn, he said, in the 50 freestyle, which he considers his best event, allowing New Canaan's Michael Kotlyar to edge him by .03.

"I was getting really jacked up. They took a while to start the race," Marcolina said of the 50. "I lost my tempo. I don't know what happened. ... So, I never expected to win the 100. I wanted to get the 50, too, and that woke me up. Like, 'What are you doing?' After that, I really want to get after that 100."

Berg called Marcolina's 100 victory "amazing," with Marcolina taking the lead early and beating another New Canaan swimmer, Brian Harrell, by .61.

He built off the experience from the class meet to motivate himself at the State Open, improving his time in the 50, and topped that once again at the 2019 Speedo Sectionals Region 1 meet at Ithaca a short time later, finishing with a personal best 50-freestyle time of 21.17.

"Overall, it was a good season," said Marcolina, who lifted the Falcons to a 10-0 record overall and in the ECC to capture the league's regular-season title. "You're not going to be able to get everything."

Marcolina is a member of the National Honor Society at Fitch, where he takes several AP classes. He is a skier and a surfing regular on the Rhode Island beaches, having surfed in California, Hawaii, Barbados and Puerto Rico, as well. He keeps his shoulder-length hair for mojo, he said.

He is the three-time winner of Fitch's Drew Fiedler Award, given to the swimmer who best epitopizes the late Fiedler — a Fitch graduate who died in Vietnam — through dedication to team, work ethic and service.

As for Berg, he's been tough on Marcolina, as he is on all his swimmers.

"You don't want to get a big head or anything," Marcolina said with a smile. "You could swim a perfect race, but Ken might not think so."

Just that Berg is waiting for the day Marcolina goes even faster.

"He has potential," Berg said. "Not every kid says, 'Coach, I want to be good.' John told me he wanted to break 20 (seconds in the 50). ... The kid is hard-working. He never lost focus. He never let anyone pull him aside and take him out of his game. The hardest thing for young people is to learn not to be afraid. I will like to see him do better in college. The story's not finished."

v.fulkerson@theday.com

The Day's 2019 All-Area Swimming & Diving Team

Player

of

the

Year — John Marcolina (Fitch)

200-yard freestyle, 100 backstroke — AJ Murko (Fitch)

200 individul medley — Bobby Hahn (East Lyme) 

Diving — Jason Blain (Waterford)

100 butterfly — Jack Zhang (East Lyme)

500 freestyle — Jack Lombardo (East Lyme)

200 medley relay — Fitch (AJ Murko, John Marcolina, Keegan Reck, Joe Vignato)

200 freestyle relay — East Lyme (Noam Sokolovsky, Bobby Hahn, Erik Stelter, Anthony Wang)

400 freestyle relay — Fitch (Joe Vignato, Keegan Reck, AJ Murko, John Marcolina)

Utility — Jeffrey Ng (NFA)