She almost quit swimming. Now, Penn’s Anna Kalandadze is breaking records and aiming for a national title.

Anna Kalandadze may be an Ivy League champion now, but three years ago, she almost quit her sport for good.

Kalandadze, a senior distance swimmer for Penn, won Ivy League titles in the 500-yard freestyle and the 1650 free this past February. Kalandadze’s time of 4 minutes, 38.86 seconds in the 500 free was 13th-best in the nation this year, while her 15:53.88 in the 1650 free was the sixth-fastest. Kalandadze will represent the Quakers in both events at the NCAA championships from March 15-18 in Knoxville, Tenn.

But the path here was not easy. Kalandadze, an Ardmore native who went to high school at Lower Merion, spent her first collegiate season swimming for the University of California, Berkeley. Kalandadze is one of at least 19 former Cal swimmers who have come forward about abuse they experienced from Cal’s former women’s swim coach, Teri McKeever.

“It was definitely a difficult decision [to come forward], but I felt that I needed to share my side of the story and just support the other girls that were going through the same thing I did,” Kalandadze said.

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Though Kalandadze had already qualified for the NCAA championships in the 1650 free midway through her freshman season, McKeever’s treatment of her drove Kalandadze to quit the team and enter the transfer portal before the Pac-12 championships that February.

Kalandadze and several of her former teammates came forward in a May 2022 article by the Orange County Register detailing the extent of McKeever’s bullying and abuse. According to the article, an investigation by Southern California News Group revealed that McKeever had pressured swimmers to compete while injured, had screamed and thrown kickboards and water bottles at swimmers, had used a racial epithet, and had accused one swimmer of lying about having epilepsy.

McKeever had at one point pressured Kalandadze to practice while she was on crutches with a hip flexor injury, according to the news outlet.

The SCNG investigation also found that at least six Cal women’s swimmers since 2018 had experienced suicidal thoughts because of McKeever’s bullying. McKeveer, who had previously been the head women’s swim coach for the 2012 U.S. Olympic team, was fired by Berkeley in January following an eight-month investigation.

Kalandadze’s top pick once she entered the transfer portal in 2020 was Penn, and the feeling was mutual for Quakers head coach Mike Schnur.

“Everybody in Pennsylvania knew how fast she was in high school,” Schnur said. “I knew on the phone talking to her that she wanted to work hard and wanted to be great. So it was one of the easiest decisions I ever made.”

And the environment Kalandadze found at Penn’s Sheerr Pool couldn’t be more different than the one she left behind at Berkeley.

“They’re like my family,” she said. “We’re all really close. And it’s definitely a special thing to be part of such a team.”

Three years removed from almost hanging up her cap and goggles forever, Kalandadze is now leaving her mark in the Ivy League record books. Her time in the 1650 free at the Ivy League championships last month was not only good enough for the Ivy League title, but it also broke Princeton’s pool record, a Penn program record set last year by Lia Thomas, and a 14-year-old Ivy League record.

The previous conference mark of 15:57.34 was set by Princeton swimmer Alicia Aemisegger in 2009, and Kalandadze beat that mark by almost four seconds.

“It means the world to me. I almost quit the sport, and coming here really saved my swimming career and my mental health,” Kalandadze said.

Kalandadze set a pool record with her winning time in the 500 free, too. She capped a Penn podium sweep in both her events at the Ivy championships, highlighting a strong core of female distance swimmers at Penn.

“We recruit distance women who have a great work ethic and enjoy challenging themselves every day in practice, and we have a long history of great women distance swimmers going back 10 years,” Schnur said. “With Anna leading the way this year, and Cathy Buroker, our other great distance swimmer, and the way the younger women followed them all season long and learned how to train and learn how to race, it builds their confidence every day, racing against someone as fast as Anna every day.”

For Kalandadze, the strength of her fellow Penn distance swimmers has helped drive her success, and she says it’s an honor to have the opportunity to represent them at the NCAA championships.

“We’re a very close group overall, and it’s a lot of fun when you have really good people to race in practice every single day, and we all just do our best to push each other and support each other,” she said.

Kalandadze has the chance this week to make more history in Knoxville. While it’s her second straight year attending the NCAA championships — she placed 42nd in the 1650 free and 49th in the 500 free last year in Atlanta — this is the highest she’s been seeded.

Kalandadze enters the meet seeded sixth in the 1650 free and 11th in the 500 free, with an opportunity to try for Penn’s second national title in women’s swimming, after Thomas’ victory in the 500 free last year.

“I’m thrilled for her,” Schnur said. “She earned this and had an amazing season, and this is a bonus. Any time you get to go to a national championship meet, you don’t take it for granted, and I know she’s not. These opportunities don’t grow on trees. To get to swim against the best kids is such a special experience for her, and for me to be able to coach her there, it’s something we really look forward to every year.”