BI Swim Club coach Jane Swanson and a group of her athletes watched a 9-year-old girl, competing in her first-ever race out in the nether reaches of lane six, win a 50-yard race in just over 30 seconds. That’s an outstanding time even for an experienced swimmer at that age.

“Who is that girl?” Swanson asked.

Nine years later, the swim coaches at several dozen major universities know exactly who “that girl” is. Helen Silver’s home phone number is on their speed dials, and hardly a day goes by without the BHS senior fielding a call from at least one or two of them.

Though she’s probably the most heavily recruited athlete in school history, it was by no means preordained that Silver would attract this kind of interest.

Soccer was her initial athletic endeavor, and she quickly became established with a team known as the Speeding Cleats.

She’s also “dabbled in Hershey track,” and many of her friends wanted her to try basketball.

“But my dad (Bob, a former world-class swimmer) has always been a big swimmer,” she said. “So he suggested ‘Why don’t you try swimming?’”

Which as things turned out, was a little like the Gates family giving little Billy a computer and telling him, “Here, son, why don’t you see what you can do with this.”

So Helen signed up with BISC. Unbeknownst to her, her dad signed her up for her first meet after two practices.

“Success became addictive,” she said.

It also became exhausting.

“For two or three years, I was doing both soccer and swimming,” she explained. “I’d swim for an hour and a half, then go play soccer for another hour. But finally it was too hard to manage both, so I had to make a decision. It was hard to stop playing soccer. All my girl friends were playing.

“But I wish I could do both, because I love soccer to this day. I just never had time to do it.”

Not surprisingly, her progress as a Spartan was steady following several years with BISC.

As a freshman she was third in the 100 back at the state meet. She won the first of three straight state backstroke titles as a sophomore. Her time as a junior (56.42) was her best, and she was second in the 200 IM. Her backstroke triumph this year – she also repeated her second place IM finish – gave her the top three times at the 2A/3A level.

Her first backstroke win also triggered a flood of mail from big-time collegiate swim programs.

“I was so excited when I got the first letter,” she said.

Now, an entire bookcase shelf is devoted to the literature and correspondence that’s since accumulated.

“A conservative estimate is that she’s heard from more than 70 schools,” said Bob Silver. “Just about every established program from the Coast Guard Academy to Stanford.”

The process accelerated in the summer after her junior year, when colleges are allowed to initiate personal contact.

“The first day that I could get calls, I got the first one about noon,” she said. “I took about three or four, then I just walked out the door.”

Not a bad idea, since there were 13 more waiting for her on the answering machine that first day alone.

Her father said that she’s taken all the attention in stride, even though she’s being wooed by the country’s most elite programs.

“If this was men’s basketball, it’d be as if Duke, North Carolina and UCLA were calling,” he explained. “But she’s been very thoughtful and very mature about how she’s gone about the process. She’s kept it in perspective. It hasn’t affected her ego or how she behaves.”

Probably one reason is that Helen Silver is far from one-dimensional. She won two awards at a juried arts competition held as part of a recent Arts Walk, one for a drawing, another for a ceramic piece.

“I’ve always loved art,” she said. “It’s almost a meditation. A project will take over my life, and it’s all I think about.”

She’s also been involved in BHS dramatic productions and has assumed leadership positions in a wide range of ASB activities.

This past summer, she expanded her horizons still further by spending nearly three weeks in Greece and Turkey.

Worth the wait

Now that the high school season is over, she’s pushed the decision-making progress up a couple of notches.

“Even before I started getting letters, I had an idea of the places I was interested in,” she said. “I don’t want to be a big fish in a small pool. So I want an established program where I’ll be challenged.

“I’m not picky about academic programs because they all give a good education. I want to save the big guns for graduate school.”

She’s pretty much narrowed the field to Cal-Berkeley, Georgia, Virginia, Northwestern, Indiana and Texas.

She also made a conscious decision to wait past the first signing period, which recently closed.

“I decided to do a late signing,” she said. “I just had way too much going on. I know I’m making the right decision, even though I may not get as much money. But it’s worth it to make sure I go to the right college.”

A major factor in the decision process is the official campus visitations she’ll begin making not long from now.

“That’ll help me see if I feel comfortable with the coaches, meeting them face to face, and see what the other girls are like,” she said. “I’m looking forward to them, because I won’t feel rushed.”

She’s already made one unofficial visit, to the University of Arizona.

“It’s in my top 10, but I’m not seriously considering it, even though I liked the girls and Tucson is beautiful. There’s just too much heat.”

Sometimes too much heat comes over the phone. Bob Silver talked about the dark side to the recruiting process.

“She knows what she wants, and where she doesn’t want to attend,” he said.

“She doesn’t have any problem saying she’s not interested.”

Some coaches don’t take rejection gracefully.

“Some coaches have gotten crabby with her,” he said. “As a parent, it infuriates me that somebody’s trying to intimidate my child. I was really shocked, both for her sake and because her sister (Emily, a sophomore who’s already won four individual state freestyle titles) will be coming up in two years.”

That two-year time frame is also significant because it’ll mark the next Olympic Games, in Athens, Greece.

“I’ll be at a perfect age then,” Helen said. “I went to the Olympic Trials two years ago. But I was so intimidated, being surrounded by all those huge intense women. Next time I’ll be physically and mentally ready.

“I haven’t reached my potential yet,” she added. “It’s exciting to think about what I might achieve.”

But for all the anticipation of what may lie ahead, she still retains vivid memories of that initial competition.

“I was standing on the block on lane six with my cap on. I wasn’t even sure how to put on the goggles. When I got to the other end, I just touched and turned.”

Now, of course, things are much different. She customarily lines up on blocks in the center lanes, she knows exactly how to put on goggles, and the original “touch and turn” has been replaced with graceful flip turns.

But one thing hasn’t changed.

Just before she plunged into water for the first time as a competitive swimmer, Helen noted that “My mom yelled, ‘Go, Helen, go!’”

Mary Sue Silver still gives her daughter the same sendoff.

And it wouldn’t be surprising if she yelled “Go, Helen, go!” yet again on a summer evening in Athens.