Estevan Golden Eels Head Coach Cassidy Reich was awarded with a tremendous honor over the weekend.

Winning the Diane Hansen Coaches Award, Cassidy was recognized for her dedication, hard work and countless hours she spends preparing and motivating members of the Eels.

Read a submitted story below about the Eels Head Coach and everything she does to make the program a great success.

Submitted by Melanie Dzeryk:

This past weekend at Provincials in Watrous Cassidy Reich was awarded the Diane Hansen Coach Award. The Diane Hansen Coaches Award is made possible by the Miller Family from Assiniboia and is in memory of Diane. Diane or Dee as she was known to her friends as was a coach with the Weyburn Silver Seals in the early to mid 1990’s. She passed away in 2007 from Cancer. Dee was a perfect example of a Summer Senior Swimmer/Coach. She would coach at every swim meet, and then put down her clipboard, just in time to get on the blocks to swim her race. She believed in having fun, not taking herself too seriously, but the moment she stepped on the blocks, she put all of her effort in her race. Dee was the first coach of Weyburn swimmers that have moved onto to be the coach and senior swimmer, so obviously Dee had a great effect on them.

The intent of this award is to keep her memory alive by celebrating her qualities in our younger coaches and swimmers. Her qualities are believed to be the traits that make for great Summer Swimming coaches.

This is an award that will not necessarily be presented each year, only in years when the candidates meet the necessary criteria. The Criteria for the Diane Hansen Award is as follows:

· A registered Saskatchewan Summer Swim Coach, who is also registered as a Senior Swimmer in the year of nomination

· Must have been involved with Saskatchewan Summer Swimming for a minimum of 5 years

· Has a positive influence over younger swimmers

· Is competitive and strives to get the best out of their swimmers, but also knows that the most important part of swimming is to have fun

· Is recognized for his/her coaching ability

· Is respected and almost idolized by their swimmers

This year we are proud to say that the head coach of the Eels, Cassidy Reich, has won this award. Cassidy Reich began swimming lessons when she was only 3 years old. She loved being in the water right from the beginning. She joined the Estevan Golden Eels Summer Swim club at the age of 7 and has been swimming with them ever since. When she was thirteen, she started out as a junior coach and continued this during her high school years. Cassidy then became an assistant coach of the Estevan Golden Eels four years ago and has been leading our coaching team as Head Coach for the past two years. Cassidy not only coaches and encourages the swimmers at every swim meet; she shows great leadership by also participating as a swimmer herself for our club. This active participation shows our swimmers that swimming is a sport to enjoy for a lifetime.

Cassidy uses positive motivation to keep the swimmers engaged and always striving to “be their best”. She teaches with kindness and shows the young and older swimmers alike the best ways to work and achieve their own individual goals in swimming. These goals can be as high as beating provincial records or as simple as correcting technique so as to not disqualify in a particular stroke. Cassidy truly enjoys interacting with the swimmers and watching them compete at meets. She loves to see the kids improve on their strokes throughout the season and better their times at the swim meets.

Cassidy sets up practices to be not only challenging but are success-orientated for swimmers of all ages and abilities. They are varied and different but yet still always fun. Cassidy has even set up team-building activities like “Pasta Night” where the older swimmers all enjoy a home-cooked pasta meal at her house before our home meet coupled with games and fun; or “Sunday Fun Day” where our younger swimmers meet at her house for fun games and activities to build the team spirit up; and the “Penny Swim” where swimmers of all ages push themselves to earn pennies per lap to exchange for candy at the end of practice. Cassidy has also started the “Swim Stars” program. In this program, two athletes are highlighted each day with pictures and videos which are shared with our club members. The “Swim Star” shares why they love to swim and Cassidy includes what makes each of these swimmers special. All of these fun activities, combined with Cassidy’s warm spirit make our swimmers want to keep coming back for practices to keep learning from her wonderful example that she sets.

Cassidy’s wonderful leadership shows true sportsmanlike behavior and she has our swimmers behaving like champions all the time. All of our swimmers look up to Cassidy as she is such a positive role model to everyone in the club. We are all so lucky to have her leading and teaching our children and we feel she deserves this award in recognition of her time and energy that she dedicates to our club.