Disclaimer: The Bacon is the April Fool’s Edition of The Beacon. The following story is purely for entertainment and is NOT meant to be taken as a serious news story!

If you thought hockey coming back to MCLA was a shock, then you might want to sit down for this one!

Hockey has officially been cancelled for the 2023-2024 academic year, and we do not yet know if it will be returning in the future. What we do know is that the MCLA Men’s and Women’s swim team will be returning in hockey’s place. Athletics has decided that it will be of everyone’s best interest not to have to travel to use a pool, so they pulled together leftover money to rebuild a pool in the campus center.

You may have heard the rumors going around about there being a secret swimming pool already in the Campus Center, but the Bacon cannot confirm nor deny this. What we can confirm is that there will be a new swimming pool put back in its original place: the Fitness Center.

The Bacon spoke with the Women’s Lacrosse Coach, Allyson Baribault, who also runs the fitness center. “This is going to be such a fantastic new addition to our school,” Baribault said, “We decided in a board meeting last Thursday that we are going to be continuing to run the fitness center. This means that we are simply going to build the pool right on top of it, and only remove the equipment for the construction. After everything is finished, we are going to put everything back and continue to run all as usual!”

Baribault told the Bacon that there were concerns about continuing to run the fitness center underwater. “Oh, we have already worked out all of the kinks on this. Each student must take a swimming test to be able to enter the pool. Once they’ve passed it, we will provide them with goggles, a very long snorkel that will in fact reach the air, and some weighted shoes so they don’t accidentally float to the surface while working out.”

Since Men’s and Women’s hockey was cancelled due to this new and improved swim team, we spoke with Heath Isaacson, the (now former) MCLA Women’s hockey coach. “I won’t lie, this is a bit of a bummer,” said Isaacson, “There was talk, however, that we may be adding in a water polo team after swimming has been going for a few months, which I dabbled in during my high school years. I will now be the assistant coach to the swim team, and if water polo works out, I’ll probably be the head coach for that.”

It has also been noted that the swimming pool will NOT be open for recreational use, and only members of the swim team will be allowed to swim in it. As for working out in the fitness center, there will be a separate entryway down to the bottom, so that the team’s practices will not be disturbed.

If you would like to join the new Men’s and Women’s swim team, please reach out to Athletics. They will also be providing more information as follows.
If you have any plant or fish allergies, please contact Allyson Baribault, as there has been talk of adding some aquarium aspects to the fitness center. These may include Clownfish, Discus, Guppies, and seaweed.