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"McKeever!"
 
"Birdsell?"
 
And so begins the tale of the recruitment of Katie McLaughlin, now a senior captain for the Golden Bear women's swim team.
 
In reality, the roots of the story date much further back, to the mid-1980s when Teri McKeever was early in her coaching career. An All-American swimmer at USC, McKeever served as an assistant at her alma mater from 1984-87, and during that time, she happened to recruit a young sprinter to the team named Mary Birdsell. But before McKeever had a chance to coach her at USC, McKeever had taken the head coaching position at Fresno State.
 
The pair didn't see much of each other for the next 20-plus years until a fateful day at an age-group meet in Southern California. McKeever, by then firmly established at Cal, was coming off being the U.S. Olympic team head coach from the 2012 London Games and had recently guided the Golden Bears to a trio of NCAA titles. Needless to say, she was one of the most well-known and recognizable people on the pool deck.
 
Birdsell, who was attending the meet, took notice, turned to her husband, James, and said, "Oh my God, there's McKeever." "You don't know Teri McKeever," a doubting James replied. Well, that was all Mary need to shout out McKeever's name.
 
Because McKeever had not kept in touch with Birdsell over the years, she had no idea that she had married James McLaughlin, and their daughter, Katie, was one of the top up-and-coming junior swimmers in the country.
 
Despite the preexisting relationship, McKeever and McLaughlin (nee Birdsell) kept the recruitment process formal after their quick reunion. But for Katie, it didn't take long for Cal to rise to the top of her college list.
 
When Katie was a junior in high school, she qualified for the Pan Pacific Championships to set up her first opportunity to swim for McKeever, who was the Team USA coach. Katie came home from the meet before the start of her senior year with her mind just about made up about where she wanted to continue her education. The impact McKeever had on Katie and another young Pan Pacs swimmer, Kathleen Baker, was significant.
 
"I was young. Kathleen and I were the youngest two there," Katie said. "It was good to have Teri be there for you. She wasn't intimidating. She cared about me more than if I were to swim well. Are you having a good time? Are you buying souvenirs? What did you do today? That was important."
 
Mary and James, though, wanted Katie to see what else might be available and encouraged their daughter to look at other schools.
 
"It wasn't that I didn't want her with Teri," Mary said. "I just wanted her to have the experience of going on recruiting trips and seeing what the options were. If that's where she ended up, that would be wonderful. She was dead set. 'No, this is where I belong.'"
 
Katie did take a recruiting trip to Cal after all, a visit that only reconfirmed her initial sentiment.
 
"I really liked how Teri had a different approach to swimming," she said. "It was more about being a good swimmer and athlete, not just grinding you in the pool and forgetting about you. It seemed like a healthy way to be a good athlete and swimmer and learning how to grow as a person. Being on campus, you could tell that the team really cared about each other. Teri wanted people to grow."
 
Before she enrolled at Cal, McLaughlin found increasing success on the national and international stage. She set a national high school record in the 100-yard butterfly and qualified for the U.S. National team for the 2015 World Championships, where she earned a gold medal as a member of the 800-meter free relay.
 
However, McLaughlin's career took an unexpected turn midway through her freshman year at Cal when she injured her neck in a training accident. The setback kept her out of the pool for several weeks. McLaughlin improved enough to place 14th in the 200 free at the Pac-12 Championships, but missed out on the NCAA meet.
 
"After my injury, I had to speak up if I needed something," said McLaughlin, who reached the finals of the 200 free and 200 fly at the 2016 Olympic Trials later that year. "It forced me to vocalize what I needed. That boosted me out of my comfort zone, which I am grateful for. I needed a big push because I used to be timid and shy. I just wanted to blend in. Now, if I need something, I'm not afraid to ask for it. It made me need to ask for what I want."
 
As a sophomore, McLaughlin continued to lower her times and had a bit of a breakthrough moment at the 2017 NCAA meet when she claimed second the 200 fly in 1:52.37 – the fastest mark for a Cal swimmer in nine years. She also won the B final in the 200 free and was a member of the Bears' runner-up 800 free relay. That summer, she competed in six events at the World University Games in Taipei and returned with three medals.
 
The results kept improving in 2018. She reached the A final in three events at the NCAA Championships – 100 and 200 fly and 200 free – and anchored Cal's 400 free relay to a school record. Over the summer, she returned to Pan Pacs and secured a spot on the U.S. team for the 2019 World Championships.
 
In her senior season, McLaughlin believes that she is going to graduate from Cal a more confident person with a larger repertoire of races than she had when she first entered college. How she responded from her injury combined with mentoring from McKeever played a significant role in her development.
 
"Where I've seen the growth is in her ability to get knocked down and get back up," McKeever said. "Not really reinventing herself, but expanding her racing. Getting her confidence back and getting her mojo back has been fun to see. That's mainly been her ability to stay healthy and be consistent in training and gives her confidence when she's racing."
 
Added McLaughlin: "Teri does a really good job making us confront things directly. I've learned how to handle things as they come up. If I'm taking better care of myself, I can do a better job taking care of people around me. I need to figure out what I need to be a better teammate and daughter for everyone around me."
 
Mary McLaughlin clearly sees the maturity and perspective her daughter has gained over the past four years.
 
"I'm proud of her tenacity," she said. "She just keeps fighting, and this sport gives you that opportunity to do that. My husband and I are almost in amazement of her toughness. She just keeps going, nothing stops her. This sport taught her that. She hit some rough times, but it didn't stop her. It put her on pause for a second, but then it projected her forward. I don't know that she would have had that experience without swimming and without Cal really supporting her and giving her those tools. Nobody doubted her. It was a matter of getting through the process."
 
It's an experience Mary truly appreciates for Katie, even if she didn't get the same opportunity to swim for Teri McKeever all those years ago.