St. Charles East sets winning college pace

From early morning to mid-afternoon on Saturday, none of the boys swimming teams at the St. Charles East College Events Invitational were able to keep pace with the host Saints.

The morning started well, with Andrew Lewarchick and Max Thompson going one-two in the diving and the Saints opened the swimming portion of the meet with victory in the 400-yard medley relay and cruised to a 455-329 victory over Highland Park in a six-team meet.

"Highland Park has a very good team," St. Charles East coach Joe Cabel said. "We were kind of pointing a little bit toward the meet. We performed well today. We had some nice drops."

That diving performance helped key the swimming success, Cabel said.

"That's the best diving we've seen at St. Charles East in some time," he said. "Nicki Schropp, the diving coach, is doing an awesome job with the kids."

John Tarpey, Nick Milosch, Mitch Milosch and John Cranfill comprised that meet-opening relay. Tarpey, Mitch Milosch, Cranfill and Nick Boryk closed the meet with a 23-second victory in the 800 freestyle relay.

January meets seldom see swimmers reach lifetime bests, but Cabel said the progression in his team's performances is upward. The Saints have a rescheduled home dual meet with St. Charles North on Tuesday and a regularly scheduled home dual meet with Metea Valley on Thursday finishing an eight-day stretch in which the team has four meets.

"We're not looking for season bests," Cabel said. "We just like to see them chipping away at it, head in the right direction and make adjustments. They actually surprised me today, so that's good to see."

Boryk won the 200 freestyle, 500 freestyle and and was second in the 100 freestyle. He won the 500 freestyle by 14 seconds.

"It's always tiring afterward, but as long as you have your team there to support you, you don't feel it," Boryk said. "You just want to go and do it for your team. That's what I did and that's what everyone on the team did."

College events meets feature longer distance races than high school meets. There is a 200-yard race in the backstroke, breaststroke and butterfly and there is a 1,000-yard freestyle as well as a 400 IM in addition to the usual high school races, and the relays are twice as long.

"It was fantastic today," Boryk said. "We had our team cheering, and it's been like this since the start of the season. We spend so much time together, we're like brothers.

Tarpey won the 100 backstroke and the 200 backstroke for the Saints' other two individual race victories.

"He just knows how to dig deep for us," Cabel said.

Of swimmers who finished second for St. Charles East, Ethan Sellers' runner-up finish in the 200 breaststroke was a highlight.

"That was a big swim for (Sellers)," Cabel said. "He's gotten over the hill and he's starting to come on strong for us."

The three District 300 schools, Dundee-Crown, Hampshire and Jacobs, compete as one coop team, and that group finished third on Saturday, behind the victorious Saints and Highland Park.

"That was a pleasant surprise," D300 co-op coach Rick Andresen said. "We swam pretty well. We have some fatigue and some illness, but overall, it was OK. We're on the right track."

Cole Guenther had a strong meet for the co-op. He was second in the 1,000 freestyle and second in the 500 freestyle while Francis Ogabon was second in the 100 backstroke, third in the 200 backstroke and third in the 400 IM.

"We still need to fine-tune some things," Andresen said. "We're lazy on turns in practice and that's something we need to tighten up. If you practice sloppy, you're going to swim sloppy in the meets."

With only nine swimmers competing, Huntley figured to struggle in the team standings, and the Red Raiders were last of the six teams. However, Huntley had strong individual performances - especially from Bryan Haage, who won the 50 freestyle, the 100 freestyle and was second in the 200 freestyle.

"We had three guys get personal bests today and I was really pleased with that," Huntley coach Barry Wells said. "Obviously (Haage) had two firsts and a second and he raced really, really well. He's an exceptional swimmer."