Ed and Alice Kropp: Swim Coaching Icons

Attend any competitive swimming or diving meet in Suffolk County and drop the name “Kropp.” Almost certainly, there will be those in attendance who will recognize the name of two legendary coaches, swimming coach Ed Kropp and his wife, diving coach Alice Kropp. Combined, the two Sayville High School coaches have more than 70 years experience coaching school-aged swimmers and divers. Not bad considering both spent little to no time in the pool as youngsters.

Ed grew up in Brooklyn, and learned much from his dad - about auto mechanics, not swimming. Watching his younger brother enjoying swimming, 16-year-old Ed finally jumped into the water and taught himself how to swim, learning by watching others. It’s a philosophy that stayed with him his entire coaching career.

“You really coach very few kids,” he said. “Most kids you teach. Most are participants in the sport. There are very few athletes. They’re another breed. You teach swimming with techniques. I picked that all up from watching others.”

“Coach has helped so much with my strokes,” said Sayville senior Kate Tobin, who’s been swimming for Kropp for seven years. “He’s very hard on us and expects a lot.” Added Sayville High School junior Hanna Sandor, “You want to work hard for him. He’s intimidating sometimes, and it’s a big deal when you get a compliment from him.”

If Kropp demands a lot of his swimmers, he also demanded a lot of himself, recognizing that he only got “fairly good” by his senior year in college at SUNY Brockport, where he swam most events, including breastroke, butterfly and freestyle. “I was the first person in my family to go to college,” he said, crediting swimming for his path. “Otherwise, I would have stayed home and been a mechanic working with my dad.”

While in college, Ed met his future wife, Alice, who was a horseback rider from Howard, N.Y., a town today of about 1,400 residents in the western portion of New York’s Finger Lakes region.

One of the opportunities lacking for Alice was competitive diving, or recreational diving. She never dove as a child, and, as strange as this might seem as an accomplished diving coach, never has. She rode horses. But in 1985 - more than 20 years after the Kropps moved to Suffolk County and Ed began teaching sixth grade at Sayville’s Sunrise Drive Elementary School - Alice joined her husband poolside.

“In 1985, the diving coach quit, and they thought I could do the job,” Alice said. “For the first couple of years, my hand was a giant video camera.” She would videotape her students’ dives, critiquing them as best she could “Diving, it’s all physics and anatomy,” Alice said, “and they’re using a giant lever [diving board].” She also got plenty of input and advice from colleagues who became friends.

Alice still questions her knowledge and ability to coach diving, but, she said, “Not as much as I used to. I figure I must be doing something right with the success we’ve had.”

Today, the Kropps talk of retiring in perhaps two years, back to Alice’s hometown. That will leave a big void in downstate swimming: in addition to coaching the boys and girls swimming teams at Sayville High School, Ed coaches for Islip Aquatics. He also coordinates the community swim program at Sayville. For her part, Alice coaches both the boys and girls dive teams at Sayville, and also coaches for Islip Aquatics.

For all their talk about retiring “while we can still do all the things we want to do,” as Alice said, neither seems to be ready to slow down. “The kids are so much fun,” Alice said. “It’s enjoyable watching them grow up and develop.” And for the students who have grown up with the Kropps?

“He definitely treats us differently, more mature,” said Sayville senior Tracey Rosa, who has swam for Kropp for eight years. “And he knows lots more than we do.”