PISCATAWAY, N.J. (Oct. 9, 2019) – It's a dream of many; a reality for few. For Federica Greco of Rutgers swimming, the dream of competing in the 2020 Summer Olympics for her native country of Italy is so close, she is seeing red.
 
Greco will take an Olympic redshirt ahead of her senior year at Rutgers University to chase that dream. The butterfly specialist from Rome won a bronze medal at the 2019 Italian National Championships in the 100-meter event in a time that sent her to her first World University Games last summer. The second fastest 200 butterflier and 200 IMer in school history, Greco's decision to forego a season wearing the Block R was not an easy one.
 
"It was a scary thought process," Greco said. "I'm really close with my class and couldn't imagine not graduating with the teammates I've been with these last four years. I finally thought, there's so much more outside of swimming and Rutgers. I need to take this opportunity. It's a dream to make the Olympics, and I'm really close."
 
Greco was geared up and cheering on her team during a dominant season-opening victory at the Rutgers Preseason Tune-Up meet. While she will not score points for Rutgers, she will train, and train hard. In fact, she'll travel on the road trips to stay on routine and maximize her time. She will sometimes swim unattached at meets with the Scarlet Knights, including the Long Course Trials hosted by Rutgers on Dec. 8.
 
She will be chasing a time faster than the minimum Italian National Team standard. Just as she has trained toward peak performance at the Big Ten Championships the last three years, Greco's primary focus next spring will be on her country's national championships from April 1-4. That will decide the final tickets punched to Tokyo for the Summer Games in 2020.
 
Greco's butterfly and individual medley prowess has no doubt aided the Scarlet Knights in dual meets and championships alike during her collegiate swimming career. Yet Rutgers head swimming coach Jon Maccoll didn't hesitate for a moment when granting the Olympic redshirt to his rising senior leader.
 
"It's a win-win for everyone," said Maccoll, entering his third season at the helm of Rutgers swimming. "We are committed to Olympic swimming first and foremost. It's a major goal, and our student-athletes can sit on scholarship for a year to train for the Olympics. It demonstrates how serious we are about that goal.
 
"For Federica, becoming an Olympian would be life-changing," Maccoll added. "She'll have professional dollars waiting for her after she has left Rutgers. That sets her up for life in whatever she chooses to do."
 
Greco plans on finishing her redshirt senior season at Rutgers during the 2020-21 academic year, when she will also earn a Masters degree at the end of her fifth year "On the Banks" thanks to extensive work during summer sessions over the past few years.
 
The Olympic ambitions are the culmination of Greco's transformation over the last 18 months. She scored a podium finish at the Big Ten Championships in March in the 100-yard butterfly in seventh place, after posting a career-best 52.37-second time in the prelims. That time ended up missing the cutoff for the NCAA Championships by an agonizing two-hundredths of a second.
 
"She left Big Tens feeling she had more in the tank," Maccoll said. "She wanted to go faster. She channeled disappointment well and turned down going to Sweden with us so she can train for the Italian Championships. Then she qualified for the World University Games based off the results in Italy."
 
It was the first time in a while that Greco had been able to shave time. She had plateaued upon arriving at Rutgers. So, what changed?
 
"I switched my mindset," Greco said. "It was all in my head. I took on a new perspective on swimming and realized it's much more than swimming. Our team became closer than ever, and the energy created a perfect place to practice and improve. Coach Maccoll showed us swimming is fun again and we all started to train for each other. The culture at Rutgers changed everything."
 
Greco's Olympic mindset is the first of the dominoes to fall this season for Maccoll's Scarlet Knights. The Long Course Trials meet on Dec. 8 is an opportunity for each Rutgers swimmer to lay down a time in a metered pool and see where they stand in contention for an Olympic invite. Rutgers has also booked the Irish National Championships, the Italian National Championships, the USA Swimming TYR Pro Swim Series, and the United States Olympic Trials on its official 2019-20 schedule to solidify its team-wide theme.
 
"This is bigger than swimming. It's even bigger than the Olympics," Maccoll said. "We want to make dreams come true, and that's something that will carry these women far beyond Rutgers and far into their careers in or out of the pool."
 
 

Bringing home some hardware to Piscataway 🥉@swimswamnews @collegeswimnews pic.twitter.com/2vuteY6TTr

— RU Swimming & Diving (@RUSwimDive) April 3, 2019

 
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