By Kaleb Knowles
Deep in the heart of the Springfield College Athletic Complex lies the narrow upward-angled walkway to the Art Linkletter Natatorium. Stepping through the glass door, the thick humidity and the bright blue waves of the water clash against the concrete tiled swimming pool. Along the slippery surface of the walkway, splashed up water from the aquatic athletes has covered the floor in a glossy sheen.
On the far end of the pool stand the diving platforms. Directly next to those platforms stands the Head Coach of the Men’s and Women’s Diving team, Peter Avdoulos, carefully examining each of his divers as they make their transition from the stretching mats to the lower diving boards.
Avdoulos’ dark gray hair and thick mustache, which hang above his upper lip, shine from the bright fluorescent lights hanging above the pool attached to wooden beams.
On the whiteboard in the corner, he has critiqued a specialized plan for each of his nine divers, a technique Avdoulos has been using since the start of his career. The divers analyze the game plan before taking their first leaps off the board.
Andrew Testa, a young diver now plunging into his sophomore season at Springfield College, takes to the board. He takes his time and controls his breathing, focusing his eyes on the far end of the pool and makes his leap. Flying through the air with the gracefulness of a bald eagle, time seems to slow down in the instant before Testa cradles his knees into his chest and somersaults in one fluid motion. Just mere inches before hitting the void of blue below him, he untucks and slips into the water with just a ripple of a splash left for the others to see.
Avdoulos nods his head in approval, but even the most perfect dive to the average viewer has endless improvements in the eyes of an experienced coach like him. Once out of the water, Avdoulos is alert and ready to key in his diver with improvements.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Avdoulos called out. “Don’t force it, just let it happen.”
This season marks the 41st for the Pride head coach, a number that has no sign of coming to an end anytime soon. For Avdoulos, there is no greater gift than seeing his athletes succeed. It is the driving force behind the motor that is still kicking well into its fourth decade.
“I pride myself on development, and most of the time our divers achieve more than they ever thought they could. That is fun for me,” Avdoulos said.
Development of those divers has been the key piece to what has ascended Coach Avdoulos to the top of the pedestal for diving coaches in the country. Avdoulos is now the longest tenured diving head coach in all of Division III, and the second longest tenured head coach in all of the NCAA. Throughout his tenure, he has had his fair share of success, including bringing his team to seven national championships, having 123 All-American honors for his divers, and more coach of the year trophies than space on the cabinet in his office. Despite the hardware and successes, it’s his connection to his athletes that counts the most.
“He’s very observant; he can read our facial expressions and our body language. How we feel about a specific dive and our mood of the day,” Testa said. “It honestly feels like a big family at the end of the day, because it might be weird to say, but he is a dad, so he really cares about us.”
Reading dives and reading people is something Avdoulos takes pride in. The tight-knit bond is a strategy for coaching, one that he has carried through into his life. Avdoulos’s coaching career began immediately after he graduated from Springfield in 1985, but coaching was not the first path Avdoulos had envisioned for his life.
He first took to the board himself in elementary school. Working his way through his childhood, diving was something that quickly intrigued him. He learned fast and shadowed the upperclassman for advice.
“Starting my junior year, I dove in high school and also at Springfield College,” Avdoulos said. “There was an age group program called the Springfield Springers, and it was run by the diving coach who coached here. And I think it was John Bryansfield. I would practice at high school, and then after that practice, I would come and practice here.”
As an athlete, he was good, but as a coach, he proved himself to be great. Just a year after he graduated from the college, he found his way back, working part-time as the interim coach for a team that no longer had one. That interim and part-time role would eventually become a full-time role as the years carried on.
“It started off. I never wanted to become a coach, and I didn’t even know about this. As I did it, I saw I was successful in helping them progress. I kind of got hooked,” Avdoulos said.
41 years later, and Avdoulos once again finds himself preparing for the season ahead. While the goal of winning meets and perfecting the art of diving is still true in his mind, Avdoulos cares more about the connection with his divers than any medals.
“I just want to develop the athletes and really see what they’ve dreamed of come true,” Avdoulos said. “Yeah, we want to be good, but we also want to have a good time in the process. I want to enjoy coming to practice, and I tell all of the divers this too: Don’t feel like you’re diving towards a result. Just do the best you can do.”
Enjoying practice is something that the team definitely does. McKenzie Aparo, who is now in her third year on the boards, truly feels how special it has been to be a part of Springfield College diving.
“We probably have the smallest team on campus, so it’s easier for everyone to be friends, and one thing that Pete emphasises is that he doesn’t want any drama and wants there to be a great team dynamic,” Aparo said.
Aparo came into the program with little experience. Converting from a gymnast to a diver was a difficult transition, but a transition that Avdoulos immediately knew how to handle.
“Pete really works miracles, like I know it comes from the divers ourselves, but he does help a lot. I know my skill level really changed from high school to college, especially in just one year,” Aparo said.
Aparo is one of the many examples of inexperienced divers that Avdoulos has helped improve significantly.
“What I look for is potential and the mindset to want to dedicate themselves to it and work to become better,” Avdoulos said. “Right now I have two kids on the team that have never dove before. And then I have some that dove in high school, so there is a wide range of ability. Here, it’s development, we make them really good, and that is satisfying and rewarding.”
Avdoulos’s specialty is not only the advice he gives about the technique of a dive, or calling when to come out of a dive. His superpower is his ability to connect with people on a personal level and be a part of a family.
His close coaching partner just down the other end of the pool, Howard Hinds, is the head swimming coach. While Hinds is still a young head coach, it didn’t take long for him to notice Avdoulos’s greatness.
“He is also a devoted family man, which shows in the patience, compassion, and balance he brings to his work and relationships with others,” Hinds said. “Just recently, I asked Pete to assist with my swimming class, and he managed to get every student to successfully dive, something I genuinely didn’t expect. That’s the kind of coach he is.”
Being the head coach meant that Avdoulos had to be away from his wife, Sue, and his three daughters, Deanna, Melanie, and Alison, a lot. In the beginning, it was something that Avdoulos struggled with. Oftentimes, he would be away from his family for multiple weeks during the championship season. Years later, his daughter Melanie committed to dive for her father, and today, she volunteers her time to follow in the footsteps that her father has left at Springfield College as an assistant coach.
“From being on the team, to now, standing next to him on the pool deck, you can definitely see his perspective on things. It’s a different type of experience seeing what the kids do now,” Melanie said. “He has been able to do this for 42 years and raise a family. I’m still here, so he’s definitely doing something right?”
So for another season, Avdoulos stands at the edge of the pool, a slight smile arching in at the corners of his lips as he watches his divers before him leap high off the boards, rotate graciously through the air, and land in the water with immense precision. In his laid back soft-spoken demeanor, he pays close attention to every detail of every dive, pushing each person to achieve their greatest potential.
This season is no different than any other season he has coached. Each one of his divers will climb back up the ladder, take a deep breath, feel the board beneath their feet and lunge themselves forward. They can take comfort in this process knowing that on the deck below, Avdoulos will be there once again to propel each diver to their fullest potential.
(Photo courtesy of Springfield College Athletics)