Northampton senior swimmer Maggie Miller commits to upstart Franklin Pierce program

By JAMIE CUSHMAN

For the Gazette

Published: 04-25-2017 8:30 PM

Northampton High School swimmer Maggie Miller announced her commitment to Franklin Pierce at a signing ceremony held by the school on Tuesday.

Miller will join the inaugural women’s swimming & diving team at Franklin Pierce, which announced in 2015 that it would add the sport to its varsity lineup in the fall of 2017.

Franklin Pierce was not on Miller’s radar when she received a recruitment email from coach Brian Fazzino. After some prodding from a guidance counselor, Miller decided to look into the school.

“He just emailed me trying to recruit people. I didn’t really think anything of it because I hadn’t heard of the school before, but then I talked to my guidance counselor at school and she was like, ‘It has your major that you want, why don’t you look into it?’” Miller said. “And I was like, ‘DII might be kind of hard for me.’ But then I talked to (Fazzino) and my times were what he wanted and then we kind of just connected from that.”

Once she visited the Rindge, New Hampshire, campus, Miller immediately knew Franklin Pierce was the place for her.

“It was my last college to visit and as soon as I got there I had that feeling that this is the one. It was a cute little campus, 2,000 people I think, it was very homey,” Miller said.

Miller did not meet with any fellow swimmers during her visit, but she did get a sense of the group she would be joining by talking with Fazzino.

“Coach Brian was very accepting and he made me feel very wanted on the team, so that’s what got me,” Miller said.

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Miller thinks Fazzino has assembled a good group of recruits that will allow the team to compete quickly.

“I think it will be good because he recruited a lot of good people, so I think people will be looking at us and we’ll have a good year making a name for ourselves,” Miller said.

Miller’s injury history has led to an interest in health science, which she will study at Franklin Pierce.

“I’ve been in physical therapy for years now for various injuries, so that’s kind of what I want to be now,” she said. “I want to help others like they helped me.”

Miller said she suffers from patella subluxation due to a shallow knee grove. It makes her knee prone to dislocation.

Miller tore her medial patellofemoral ligament playing softball in March 2015 and then had MPFL reconstruction surgery in May.

As a sprinter, Miller will focus on the 50-yard, 100-yard, and possibly the 200-yard freestyle at Franklin Pierce, but she also has experience swimming the 50 and 100 butterflies.

“Just meet new people, have a good workout everyday, get some goals that I’ve been trying to get to for a while, and you know, have fun,” Miller said.

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