Allan McCallum has been patiently waiting since the month of January.
 
He's been cooped up in his office planning for his first season at the helm of a brand new swimming program.
 
When he was hired to become the University of Mary's first ever head swimming coach on January 5, he probably circled October 7 in red pen on his desk calendar.
 
In three days McCallum and his swimming team will start the Marauders inaugural season.
 
"I've been here planning and working on everything since January," McCallum said. And when the first day of practice started, I was like, "alright it's finally here."'
 
McCallum and his graduate assistant coach, Dorottya Lennert, bring a lot of experience to the first year program that will compete in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference this season against six other schools.
 
The Montana native was an all-conference swimmer at Texas Christian University and spent time as a student-coach at TCU before coaching at the high school, club and collegiate levels.  
 
Lennert swam for New Mexico State from 2012-2016 and was named the Western Athletic Conference Swimmer of the Year as the Aggies finished second at the 2016 WAC Swimming and Diving Championships.  
 
Lennert brings a lot of experience to a young Marauders roster that features 14 freshmen and one sophomore.
 
Freshman individual medley swimmer Madi Smith liked the idea of joining a first year college swimming program but also knew there would be challenges.
 
"You get to build your own traditions, form the team and share your high school traditions with everyone else's," Smith said. "But I knew it was going to be rough, not everything was going to be planned out."
 
Smith is one of the four Montana natives on the team and with McCallum's strong ties to the state, he was able to receive some insight from other high school coaches about student-athletes in the area.
 
McCallum used a straightforward approach to recruiting; he wanted to get student-athletes excited about building a family environment around a brand new program.  

"I think the biggest thing is developing team camaraderie, making it their family on campus, making sure that they have that good team atmosphere in the pool and out of the pool," McCallum said. "I think that is very important as we build a culture of a team that has a family feel to it."
 
And freshman backstroke and freestyle swimmer Karyssa Nelson has already felt that family feeling within the first few weeks of being on campus.
 
"Coming into a new year is kind of intimidating because we don't really have any standards so we have to set them for everybody else," Nelson said about joining the Marauders. "But honestly, it couldn't have gone better the first day that we all came together. We eat together, we go to the cafeteria together and have late night studies so it already feels like a family."
 
There will be no late night studying sessions happening Thursday night as the Marauders travel to Aberdeen, S.D., for the Northern State Triangular.
 
Mary will compete against Northern State and Augustana University at 5:30 p.m. inside the Aberdeen YMCA on Friday.
 
"We have a lot of potential in the water and the kids have great work ethic, so I think we are going to do some cool things," McCallum said about the 2016-2017 season. "We are constantly improving but its not going to be an overnight process."
 
And when the meet starts, McCallum's 10 month wait will finally be over and his journey as Marauders first ever swimming head coach will officially start.
 
"I'm just very fortunate," McCallum said about the opportunity he received from Mary. "It's a once in a lifetime opportunity to start a program and I'm living the dream."
 
#marauders#