February 15, 2022

SEC Men’s Swimming and Diving Community Service Team Named

By: SEC Staff
SECU (Twitter: @TheSECU)

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — The SEC sponsors Community Service Teams for all 21 league sponsored sports. The Community Service Team looks to highlight an athlete from each school who gives back to their community in superior service efforts. The 2022 SEC Men’s Swimming & Diving Community Service Team is as follows:

Cole Brown, Senior, Alabama

An SEC Championships scorer and a member of the SEC Academic Honor Roll, Brown serves as the chair of The University of Alabama Student-Athlete Advisory Committee’s community service committee. In addition to directing SAAC’s outreach efforts, he has given of his time to several projects, including the Crimson Tide’s Halloween Extravaganza, A Night to Shine, the Alberta Head Start reading initiative, Habitat for Humanity, Project Angel Tree and the Alberta Easter Egg Hunt.

Michael Bonson, Sophomore, Auburn

Bonson is in his second year at Auburn and has made helping in the community a priority both on campus and back in his home state of Louisiana. Over the last two years, he has worked with special needs children and teens at the Opelika Sportsplex and helped them prepare for Special Olympics. Bonson also participated in the Beat Bama Food Drive in 2020 and 2021, helping collect food to benefit the Food Bank of East Alabama. Last year, he helped in collecting money and supplies to support the relief efforts of Hurricane Ida, a Category 4 storm that ripped through his home state.

Advait Page, Junior, Florida

Page has helped out at Talbot Elementary School, Noah’s Endeavors, and the Night to Shine Prom. At the prom, he helped to take pictures with those attendings, play basketball, and even be paparazzi. Page has also been involved with the International Student-Athlete Meet-Up.

Keegan Walsh, Senior, Georgia

Walsh serves as the co-president of the University of Georgia Student-Athlete Advisory Committee, as elected by vote of the student-athlete population and athletics staff. In his role, he organizes bi-weekly meetings to discuss matters of athlete well-being, leadership workshops, and community outreach relations. Walsh also serves as the leader of the Behavioral Medicine subcommittee, helping promote the importance of mental health for the student-athlete population. He is a member of the Leadership, Education, and Development Academy (L.E.A.D.), a 40-member group that helps student-athletes build leadership skills, network with professionals, and facilitate personal growth. In other activities, Walsh worked with the Gwinnett County Board of Elections in June 2020 to help with the distribution of provisional ballots and voter registration cards for the primary election, also helping with administering voting day operations. He also helped organize the UGA Athletic Association’s participation with The Salvation Army for their 2021 holiday bell ringing operation in the Athens community. Previously, Walsh served as the vice president of member development for the UGA Finance Society, creating a mentorship program that paired underclassmen and upperclassmen together to broaden business experience, along with presenting workshops designed to assist with resume building, personal branding, and interviewing. He also worked as a swimming coach for the Cricket Commons Cyclone Swimming Team for four years as a head and assistant coach. Walsh has been named to the CSCAA Scholar All-America Team, J. Reid Parker Director of Athletics Honor Roll, and SEC Academic Honor Roll in each of his previous three seasons, earning Presidential Scholar Honors (4.0 GPA) in the spring 2020 semester. He was awarded the Ramsey Scholarship for Academic & Athletic Excellence for the 2021-22 season.

Nick Caruso, Freshman, Kentucky

Caruso logged several hours of community service during his first semester at Kentucky, serving at God’s Pantry and Tri for Sight. His community service projects have included unloading and stocking canned food, preparing and delivering meals, and assisting with cleanup and breakdown after a triathlon.

Spencer Adrian, Junior, LSU

Adrian aided the Halloween BOOzar, an annual free event that provides a safe and fun environment for children of all ages and their families to enjoy trick-or-treating activities and carnival games while interacting with LSU student-athletes. He is also a representative of the Student Athlete Advisory Committee, which is committed to providing insight to the student athlete experience.

Danny Kovac, Senior, Missouri

Kovac has worked with Special Olympics, Swim Across America, the local food bank, the box car derby, trail clean-ups and has fostered a dog. He claimed five All-America honors at the 2021 NCAA Championships and four All-America honors at the 2019 NCAA Championships. Kovac was named to the 2020-21 Winter SEC Academic Honor Roll.

Rafael Davila, Senior, South Carolina

Davila has participated in several team-based community service events during his time as a Gamecock. He lists his favorites as the Relay for Life fundraiser and collecting school supplies for local elementary schools. Davila also assists the swimming community in his home country of Venezuela. He often donates his additional swim equipment to members of his community back home. Davila’s family also delivers toys to local hospitals in Venezuela over the holidays. He is a 2018 CSCAA Scholar All-American honorable mention, and was named to the 2018 SEC All-Freshman Team and the 2019 All-SEC Second Team. Davila has also served as a Marketing intern at the University.

Brett Champlin, Junior, Tennessee

Champlin was a member of the 2020-21 VOLeaders Academy, which was developed to cultivate positive student-athlete leaders through sport to create positive social change. He earned 20 community service hours throughout his time with the program. Champlin’s time with the program ended with a 10-day cultural exchange trip in July to Belize, where he applied leadership skills and participated in service opportunities focused on community development and social change. One of the main community projects that the group worked on was stripping paint and then entirely repainting three school buildings in Belize. Champlin also spent numerous hours interacting with kids and teaching them different sports throughout the trip.

Peter Simmons, Senior, Texas A&M

Simmons has been a leader among his peers when it comes to community involvement with his biggest commitment coming with the Aggies CAN initiative, the largest student-athlete run canned food drive in the nation. He helped lead the campaigning efforts for the canned food drive, while also collecting cans at various events. Simmons has also spent time reading to student at Spring Creek Elementary School. He has dedicated 39 hours to community service in his career, over 10 hours coming in 2021-22 while balancing an intense academic schedule, swimming and his involvement in SAAC. Simmons is the president of A&M’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee this year, preciously serving as vice president and as a team representative. He has served as a Traditions Night Huddle Leader. In the classroom, Simmons has earned TAMU Distinguished Student honors, and in the fall, he received the Craig C. Brown Outstanding Engineer Award. He has been a multi-year member of the SEC Academic and AD Honor Rolls.