A tough loss almost kept Kutztown University senior swimmer Laura Heebner from winning.

It wasn’t the type of loss you would expect in sports — that would have been much easier to handle.

Heebner, before making the move to Kutztown University, lost her coach of eight years, Bob Cuthbert, who passed away her senior year at Easton High School.

She wondered if she could swim again under a new coach.

“I didn’t even know if I was going to swim in college at all,” Heebner said, “because I had been with the same swim coach for eight years. But everyone was like, ‘No, he would want you to swim.’”

So she took that advice and dived into her college career at KU.

Little did she know, her new coach, KU’s Tim Flannery, was a mirror image of Cuthbert.

“Coach Flannery reminds me of him,” she said. “The stories, his humor, the way he coaches: He just reminds me of my high school coach.”

Now, more than three years later, college has been everything she thought it would be and more.

“I never expected college to be this awesome,” Heebner said. “I’m so sad that I’m graduating.”

Heebner may leave KU, but her name won’t — at least for the time being.

Laura Heebner, right, is honored at halftime of the 2008 Homecoming football game after being named the 2008 Homecoming Queen. Next to her is the Homecoming King, KU student Nicholas Piccari.

On Dec. 6, Heebner etched her name into the KU record books at the Franklin & Marshall Invitational, winning the 400 individual medley in 4:46.34.

It’s a record she has worked so hard to break.

She had come within two-tenths of a second of the record her sophomore and junior seasons, so for her, it was a relief to finally set the record.

“I was very excited about it because I have been trying for four years now to get it,” she said. “It meant a lot. It was absolutely awesome. I looked over into the stands and saw my dad cheering and my entire team was cheering, because they knew how close I have been.”

Heebner hasn’t just enjoyed success in the pool. She is a two-time Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference Scholar-Athlete and a four-time member of the Dean’s List.

Living with roommates who are not athletes, it can be tough to stay focused on studies, but Heebner still found a way, even hiding in her room, if necessary.

“All of my roommates are not on a team and I live up in the attic, so I like lock myself up there,” she said, with a laugh. “I actually think swimming keeps me in line with everything. It keeps me on a schedule.”

She broke that schedule early in the season, however, in order to be at the KU Homecoming football game because she was up for 2008 Homecoming Queen. Coach Flannery gave her the permission to miss a meet to be there.

“He said to me, ‘Since I’m letting you miss a swim meet you better win,’” Heebner said.

And she did.

Even though she missed the swim meet, she still couldn’t avoid the water that day, standing in a soaking rain when her name was called for Homecoming Queen.

But nothing — not the pressure of breaking a record, the college life or the rain — can keep her from winning.

She proved that when she made the choice to go to KU.

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