Senior captains played together in high school before anchoring rebuilding process
By ANDREW SOUKUP
Associate Sports Editor
A hulking, trash-talking post player sporting a gold tooth quickly caught the attention of David Graves at a high school basketball camp.
Although both players had just finished their freshman years of high school, Graves found himself gawking at the physical player who controlled the inside and dominated opponents.
"He intimidated the hell out of me," said Graves.
Little did he know that Harold Swanagan would quickly become his closest friend and that the two of them would graduate from college seven years later as major contributors to the sudden turnaround of the Notre Dame basketball program.
"We're like brothers," Graves said. "There's days where we're fighting, there's days where we're back together. In the end, we've always had each other's back."
In Kentucky, young boys do one of two things. Either they fall in love with basketball or they move out of state. Basketball is life in the state where residents live and breathe Wildcat blue. It just seemed natural that Swanagan and Graves would grow up bleeding basketball.
While the two spent high school summers playing on the same AAU teams, they both came from very different backgrounds. Graves had strong family support and easily managed good grades. Swanagan's parents were always moving in and out, and he spent much of his life with his grandmother and great aunt. But despite different backgrounds and upbringings, the two seemed to have mutual respect for each other. Graves became a source of stability for Swanagan, while Swanagan became a source of inspiration for Graves.
The pair had often talked about going on to play college basketball together. And when it came time to choose a college, Graves spurned his hometown college and committed to play for John MacLeod at Notre Dame. But it didn't look like Swanagan would join him.
Swanagan was interested in Notre Dame, but he didn't think MacLeod was interested in him. Ironically, Notre Dame was very interested in Swanagan, but didn't think he wanted to play for the Irish. Had Graves not made a timely phone call to clear up the problem, Swanagan would have played college basketball at another school.
"Look, you should take a visit up there," Graves told his friend. "If you like it, we can play together for four more years and turn the program around."
Swanagan hopped on the next plane to South Bend and loved everything about the campus. Even after he committed, it was a fight for him to clear the admissions department. They didn't think Swanagan, who struggled academically in high school, would be able to succeed in the classroom at Notre Dame. But when Swanagan is hit, he never falls down. At Notre Dame, he worked to prove them wrong. He studied hard and earned solid grades, culminating in a personal-best 3.5 grade point average last semester.
"I believed in myself, but I don't think a lot of people believed in me," he said. "What motivates me is people thinking I can't do things ... People doubted me. I guess I'm proving them wrong now."
During MacLeod's eight years as head coach at Notre Dame, the Irish had never qualified for the NCAA tournament, never won a game in four years in the Big East tournament, and had finished over .500 only three times. Graves and Swanagan joined highly-touted New Jersey recruit Troy Murphy in what was MacLeod's last — and best — recruiting class at Notre Dame. And when they arrived, they made a pact to turn the Notre Dame basketball program around.
"We didn't care whether we were going to be on the cover of ESPN," Graves said. "We just wanted to get this place back to where it needed to be."
That didn't happen their first year. While Murphy dominated the Big East and Graves emerged as a potent perimeter player, the Irish still finished 14-16. In fact, Graves lost more games in his first year of college basketball than he did between sixth and 12th grade.
"If you look at where we came from in high school, we all came from winning programs, and we weren't used to losing," Swanagan said. "Freshman year, it was really tough for us to lose as many games as we lost. We wanted to turn the program around and to be able to look back in four years and say we did our job."
It was an attitude the trio would make sure they passed on to each new class of freshmen. And they made the message very clear. Moral victories against top-ranked opponents wouldn't cut it anymore, they said. The final score was all that mattered.
"Right when I came in," said junior Matt Carroll, "they told me, 'Last year we were OK, but didn't do any postseason stuff. Listen. We're going to turn this thing around and be a national contender.'"
But if the players were determined to turn around the program, they had trouble finding a coach who wanted to stick with them. When MacLeod resigned after Graves, Swanagan and Murphy completed their first season, Matt Doherty was hired as head coach. But just one year later, Doherty bolted for North Carolina and Mike Brey was hired as the third basketball coach in three years.
Through all the personnel changes, Graves, Swanagan and Murphy formed the foundation of a team that qualified for the NCAA tournament in their junior year. In fact, after Murphy left a year early for the NBA, the only three people who had been affiliated with the Notre Dame basketball program for more than three years were Graves, Swanagan and strength and conditioning coach Tony Rolinski.
"It feels like I've been here 12 years because of all the people that have circulated through here," Graves said. "A lot of players in the country would have transferred. But when you have players in the school that trust the program and have blind faith, things will work out. If I didn't have faith in this place, I would have left."
Graves, Murphy and Swanagan made sure none of the younger players lost faith, either. And as MacLeod, Doherty and Brey passed through the revolving door to the office of Notre Dame basketball coach, the players remained the cornerstone of the basketball program.
"[When I first came in, they were] a little in shock, wondering what my style would be like," Brey said. "But because of all the things they went through with the coaching changes and being beat up early, they're a pretty resilient group. They've been through just about anything, and you have to like their mental toughness."
While Graves and Swanagan are close friends with all 10 other members of the team, there is a special bond between the Kentucky natives that only they can understand. They are a pair that understands each other's inner secrets and deepest thoughts. When Graves was replaced by Swanagan in the starting lineup midway through last season, it was Swanagan who understood the frustration Graves was feeling. When a determined Swanagan wanted to prove he could succeed at Notre Dame, Graves joined him in study hall.
"I haven't always had family around to talk to, and when I don't, I have Dave to talk to," Swanagan said. "Everytime I'm in need or I need to talk to somebody, he's there."
"He's persevered through so much. You think you have things bad, and then you look at him and you say you have it as good as you can," Graves said. "Everytime you come into contact with Harold, you enjoy your life."
In the one season with Matt Doherty as head coach, the Irish narrowly missed a NCAA tournament berth and finished second in the NIT. Last year, Graves and Swanagan celebrated Notre Dame's first Big East West Division Championship in school history and helped lead the Irish to a 20-10 record and an appearance in the NCAA tournament — the first for the Irish in 11 years.
They've had their own individual success, too. Until Swanagan missed a game earlier this season against Colgate, the pair had played in every single college game together. And Graves needs just 27 more 3-pointers to set the all-time Notre Dame record for most career 3-point shots made.
"They came in here when it was absolutely rock bottom, and they helped lead this program back to the NCAA tournament and win a league championship," Brey said. "For them, I feel good that they are going out on a very positive not and can feel they re-established our program."
While each player says they want to return to the NCAA tournament and make another shot at the Big East title, deep inside, there's a small part of each player that is elated at what the duo has already accomplished at Notre Dame — both on and off the court.
"When I first came here, I didn't even know if I was going to be here for four years, if I was going to fail out because people thought I didn't have the ability to do the things at school to succeed and play basketball," Swanagan said. "Now, I'm nearing the end, and it's a big relief to me and my family."
"It's all been very satisfying," Graves said. "It's what I wanted us to do. I wanted to be a part of the rebuilding and to see it fold out before my eyes, and it's been a blessing."
When college basketball is a distant memory, Graves and Swanagan will still be calling each other up on the phone, laughing about life. They'll talk about how they transformed a dismal basketball program into one that is nationally respected. And they might even be able to watch the Irish play in the Final Four.
They might even remember that day, years ago, when they first met in a Kentucky gym. Then, they'll talk about how they anchored a program in transition and each other.
"There's always going to be a special bond between me and David," Swanagan said. "We grew up together in high school, we played college ball together, and it's going to be a fact that we're going to spend some holidays together after we graduate. He's part of my family now, and we're going to stick together."
All Sports Stories for Friday, January 18, 2002
