Fishers Area Swimming Tigers coach Joe Keller received the Brent Rutemiller Award at the International Swim Coaches Association’s ORCA Awards, which took place April 17 and 18 in St. Petersburg, Fla. The award honored Keller’s perseverance after battling through a brain tumor. (Photo provided)
Recognized for perseverance after battling brain tumor
By RICHIE HALL
Since becoming the head coach of Fishers Area Swimming Tigers, Joe Keller has helped the club become one of the pre-eminent swim clubs in Indiana and the entire country.
Keller has led the club with his pleasant, thoughtful and calm manner. That allowed him to carry on through a health crisis that Keller not only recovered from, but received recognition for the way he handled it.
Keller received the Brent Rutemiller Award at the International Swim Coaches Association’s ORCA Awards, which took place April 17 and 18 in St. Petersburg, Fla. The award honored Keller’s perseverance after battling through a brain tumor.
The coach began having symptoms, or “episodes” of the tumor in the Spring of 2023.
“I was sitting at home on a Saturday afternoon in the recliner,” said Keller. “All of a sudden my foot started to go numb and this weird sensation worked its way up my leg, and it went away. I thought maybe it was a pinched nerve or something like that. A month later, it happened again, but it went up the right side of my body into my right arm.”
Keller provided this photo of his MRI that showed the tumor in his brain. Much of it was removed by surgery and found to not be cancerous. (Photo provided)
As the next two years went on, the sensations became more frequent and severe, which eventually led to the diagnosis of meningioma, a tumor that develops in the meninges, the thin layers that cover the brain and spinal cord.
“The reason why they became more frequent and more severe was because the tumor was growing,” said Keller. “It was pushing against my brain and it was causing irritation, and that’s when I would have a seizure. It was starting to happen where it was becoming a little debilitating when it would happen. I would always have an aura that it would happen.”
Keller went to see a neurosurgeon in February 2025, and the doctor told the coach “we’re going to have to do surgery because [the tumor] has gotten really big. We need to do this pretty soon.”
Keller thought the definition of soon was August. The doctor’s definition was two weeks.
“My 30th wedding anniversary is on April 1,” said Keller. “Is there any way we can wait until after that?”
“Okay, we’ll wait,” said the doctor. “But April 3, you’re having surgery.”
The surgery removed much of the tumor and it was found to not be cancerous. Keller recovered quickly; although he had to stay for the entire month of April, he was able to do some work from home about two weeks after surgery.
“Swimmers are tough people and they’re used to doing hard things,” said Keller. “I compartmentalized it a lot. Let’s go do this, let’s get it done, we’ll take the next step and hopefully things work out. I had a lot of support. I’m a person of faith and that was a real anchor for me.”
The Brent Rutemiller award honors the former publisher of Swimming World Magazine and CEO of the International Swimming Hall of Fame who passed away from cancer in 2024. Keller originally was not going to go to the ceremony, but thought it over “and decided it was a tribute to Brent.” Keller said it was way to honor Rutemiller and others who “aren’t as fortunate as I am.”
Mike Gannon, whose daughter Grace Gannon is a swimmer for FAST and won the Girls 13-Year-Old Swimmer of the Year award at the ORCAs, realized Keller would receive the award just moments before it was announced when the speaker was introducing the award – “He’s talking about Keller!” said Gannon.
Gannon said it was “so deserving because when he had that tumor that had to be removed, he was back, like he didn’t blink an eye. He was just grinding.”
Keller said he didn’t want his swimmers to be distracted by his condition, so he minimized it, creating “a situation where they thought ‘Okay, not too big a deal.’ It wasn’t until after surgery and my return and over time people realized the severity of it and what it was.
“I had a belief that everything was going to turn out fine. It’s kind of my attitude and approach. And fortunately, it did turn out all right.”
