Stevenson impresses in win at Libertyville

Stevenson had many of its girls handling off events Tuesday, trying their hand at races they might not normally swim.

Their results were hardly off, though, as the Patriots delivered the top finisher in every event in their first conference test of the year, outscoring host Libertyville 122-64 and improving to 2-0 in girls swimming dual meets.

"Putting people in different events also gives you kind of a break, and it makes us stronger by making sure everybody can swim different races," said Stevenson's Erin Cunningham, who won the 100-yard backstroke and took part in two winning relays. "Everybody works so hard in practice, keeping positive in practice. That keeps us working as a team, and that really helps us when we get into meets."

Martha VanLieshout took over some breaststroke duties from Ashley Wanland for the night, winning both the 100 breaststroke (1:09.14) and the 200 individual medley (2:10.85). Wanland switched over to the 100 freestyle, winning in 55.60 in her only solo event of the night. Tori Alland successfully switched to the 200 freestyle (1:57.65) and took second in the 100 freestyle (55.79), while April McKee won both the 100 butterfly (1:00.80) and the 50 freestyle (25.81).

"Basically, meets like this make sure that they're well-rounded," Stevenson coach Karl Milkereit said. "There have been years in the past where someone gets sick, so when you have a lot of people who can do a lot of different things, you're always going to have a backup plan."

One thing that remained the same was Kerrin Seymour winning the diving competition for Stevenson, with a total score of 219.25.

The Patriots took the top two spots in the 500 freestyle, with strong swims by Michelle Pliskin (5:22.71) and Sarah Dolejs (5:30.61) and did the same in the backstroke thanks to Cunningham (1:02.89) and Melanie Koto (1:03.72).

"I've been working really hard on my kicks for the backstroke," Cunningham said. "And having Melanie Koto next to me really helped, just seeing her and helping pace each other. It's a little competition within, and it's always fun when we both swim well."

For Libertyville, the meet was its third in a row against one of the state's top-ranked teams, as the young Wildcats had already swam New Trier and Glenbrook South -- and they have Lake Forest next on the dual-meet schedule.

"We've swum three teams among the top 10, so right now, our team's kind of wondering how good they are," Libertyville coach Greg Herman said. "But when they step back and realize they've been swimming the best teams in the state, once they start to swim everyone else, hopefully they'll realize how good they can be.

"The month of September we're going to get beat up and bloody. Hopefully, by October we'll realize what we can do and by November we'll be awesome."

The Wildcats got a pair of solid races from Dana Davidsen, who placed second in the 200 freestyle (2:01.80) and third in the breaststroke (1:10.82) behind teammate Maggie Boling (1:10.73). Freshman Whitney Mitchell took second in the IM (2:15.12), and diver Brittany Tazzioli finished second with a 198.35 score.

"We had good swims all over the place," Herman said. "We didn't set the pool on fire, but we competed and swam Stevenson well."