Press and the princess
Media darling Taryn Swiatek has come a long way
By TERRY JONES -- Edmonton Sun
PORTLAND, Ore. -- She sat in the lobby of the team hotel here yesterday as media from here, there and China took a number and waited their turn to talk to her.
"I'm not really used to this," said Taryn Swiatek.
"I thought I was going to be the third keeper, that I'd get on the bus, go to practise, come back and shower ..."
Instead she was sitting there an hour before practice, doing interview after interview as if she was Charmaine Hooper, Christine Sinclair, Kara Lang or somebody.
Come in and register a shutout in Canada's first-ever World Cup win and then make one of the greatest saves your coach has ever seen and end up as the national netminder for Canada's first-ever quarter-final game tonight against China Get used to it.
"I'm trying not to let it distract me. I'm trying not to let it wreck my rhythm. It's only different if you make it different,'' said the Calgary keeper. "It's all about team. It's not all about me.''
She says she's the same Taryn Swiatek she was when all this started a week ago in Columbus, Ohio.
"I haven't checked my e-mails and I'm not going to until after this is over. I have talked to my mom and dad in Calgary and they're really excited. My mom is coming down for the game.''
She told mom and dad just to tell everybody who is asking that "it's a lot of fun and a unique experience.''
Getting the picture? Keepers are supposed to be like kickers. A little off. A little out there. A little loco.
Swiatek seems so, well, sane.
"I'm only sane on the outside,'' she says.
SANE AND QUIET
Coulda fooled Christine Sinclair.
"She's not only sane, she's quiet,'' said Sinclair. "Nothing gets to her. You look at her before the game and you'd never know she's about to play in a World Cup game.''
Coach Even Pellerud says she's a study.
"She's always on the same level,'' he said.
"Goalkeepers are usually a little different, for sure. But she's different from most keepers. She just does her job.''
Keeper coach Sven Brodsgaard said after Karina LeBlanc gave up four goals to Germany in the opener, they went to Swiatek for reasons not totally based on talent.
"She's our strongest goalkeeper mentally,'' he said. "She has a real ability to maintain her focus, no matter what is going on in front of her or around her.''
Swiatek said she was more surprised to get the Argentina start than the one against Japan that followed or the big one tonight if Pellerud gives her the nod again as expected.
"I was so surprised to start against Argentina because it's not often, in a tournament much less the World Cup that you see a team changing its keeper. On the other hand, I don't think there is another country here which has the depth at the position as we do in Canada,'' she said of the three, which also includes fellow Calgarian Erin McLeod, the FIFA U-19 Women's World Championship goalie from last summer in Edmonton.
It was the going-away game against Mexico in Edmonton where she came away with the idea she was No. 3. Pellerud started LeBlanc and then went to McLeod.
"I didn't have many games,'' she said.
But she had the Pan-Am Games. Playing behind a largely U-19 lineup, she led the team to the gold medal game and put on a stunning show against essentially the same Brazil team that is here, to take the game to golden-goal overtime.
MORE CONFIDENCE
"That gave me a little more confidence in my abilities,'' she said. "That gave me experience in a high-pressure game.''
Pellerud says Swiatek isn't a out-of-nowhere story, she's a comeback-of-the-year sort of story.
"She's an amazing comeback. She was out one whole year after suffering a knee injury,'' he said of the University of Calgary Dinos keeper. "I think having that injury made her much more mature.''
Swiatek says that's it. Exactly.
"I gave it a whole year off to give it a chance to heal itself. I didn't want to wreck my body,'' said the 22-year-old. "I was out of the program and didn't know if I'd be back. I had to look at giving it up and, going through all that, I think it made me more at ease with myself as a person. Soccer isn't everything. It taught me not to be afraid.''
