COLORADO SPRINGS – Loyola University Maryland graduate McKenzie Coan '18 will be looking for more medals this summer when she competes in the Paralympic Games for the fourth time.
 
The 2018 Loyola graduate was named to Team USA on Monday, giving her the chance to add to her four gold and two silver medals won at the last three Paralympic Games.
 
The swimming program begins on Thursday, August 29 in Paris.
 
The Clarkesville, Georgia, native won gold in the 400-meter freestyle S7 category at the 2020 Paralympics in Tokyo. She also picked up silver in the 100-meter freestyle, was fourth in the 100-meter backstroke and eighth in the 50-meter freestyle at the games that were held in 2021.
 
She was a triple gold-medal winner at the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, taking first in the 100-meter, 400-meter and 50-meter freestyles in the S7 category. Coan was a part of the 400-meter freestyle relay team that earned silver, and she was also fifth in the 100-meter backstroke and sixth in the 50-meter butterfly.
 
Coan's first Paralympic experience came in London for the 2012 games before she began her studies at Loyola. There, she was sixth in the 400-meter freestyle.
 
She also has won 16 medals – eight gold, seven silver and a bronze – in four different World Championships.
 
Coan began swimming during aquatic therapy in 2001 having been diagnosed with osteogenesis imperfecta (brittle bone disease) as a child.
 
Her participation in Paris will mark the fifth-straight Paralympic Games in which a current, former or future Loyola student-athlete has participated.
 
Philip Scholz, '11, swam in the 2008 Paralympic Games in Beijing; Coan participated in the 2012, 2016 and 2020 games; McClain Hermes, '22, was also a member of Team USA in 2016 and 2020; and, Alyssa Gialamas, '18, was a member of the United States team in 2012 and 2016.