Alexander, Barrington set for state
Greg Alexander is soft-spoken and polite.
After his winning 100-yard breaststroke effort at the Mid-Suburban League meet, I asked Barrington's junior standout to compare this year's team to the one from the previous year.
He politely explained how different this year's Barrington team was - far younger, much less experienced.
His point was well taken.
After all, in today's state meet, Barrington's won't have a single senior competing. So this young group has had to forge its own identity.
Alexander, along with junior Dan Comyn and sophomore Leo Hayden, are the only Barrington swimmers who have previously competed in the state meet. But after today, they'll have a whole lot of company, as a new group of Barrington swimmers test the waters in today's state preliminaries at Evanston (9 a.m. diving; 3:30 p.m. swimming).
Alexander qualified as an individual in the 200 IM and the 100 breaststroke. He has the potential to make the top 12 and score points in both races, but his best chance is probably in the breaststroke.
Hayden will race in the 200 free and 100 butterfly, with the fly his better opportunity to score. His sectional time (52.06) in the fly qualified him 13th.
Comyn made the 50 free individually and has legs on all three relays, all of which have a chance to earn points. Alexander and Hayden will both swim two relays.
Among the first-timers for Barrington are sophomore Tom Clement, who will lead off the medley relay and who made it as an individual in the 100 backstroke, and sophomore diver Nolan Presmyk, who earned at at-large berth after a strong effort at the Stevenson sectional last weekend.
The freestyle relays will benefit from the emergence of sprinters such as Jake Strauss and Matt Lee, who weren't far from the state cut individually and are just the kind of competitors needed for relay success.
There's one more big difference for Alexander: Last year, he need to completely taper just to make the state field. This time around, he's saved his peak performance for the state meet.
While he has awfully nice manners out of the pool, Alexander's competitors have seen a very different side of him while he's in it.
He's proven to be ruthless toward competitors, a leader on his team both in terms of top-end performance, and also with consistency from meet to meet throughout the season.
First-year Barrington coach John Valentine quipped before the sectional meet, "Coaches get paid to worry."
True enough - but not about guys like Greg Alexander. He's just the kind of swimmer who has helped Barrington extend its winning tradition.
Chiero leads Conant: Cougars senior Ryan Chiero wanted to go out with a bang this year, and he's right on track to do just that.
Chiero won both the 50 and 100 freestyles at the Stevenson sectional, and his times in both races have him well-positioned to score points at the state meet.
In the 50, he has the ninth-fastest seed time (21.55), and in the 100 free, he has the eighth-fastest seed (47.37). That's a huge upgrade over his junior year, when Chiero qualified in both events, but not by a lot.
The bulk of the credit goes to Chiero, but the arc of his improvement is consistent with that shown by virtually everybody on the varsity roster at Conant this season. The Cougars will also have the 200 free relay of Chiero, Will Landgren, Palmer Lynch and Chad Woytus competing at state, which only became possible as the latter two developed as top-notch sprinters at season's end.
Just as impressive is that coach Brian Drenth's team had strong season-ending performances from breaststrokers Victor Lim and Brandon Grzegorek as well as senior co-captain Matt Ebert in the 100 butterfly at the sectional.
Based on all that evidence, Drenth was recognized by his peers at Stevenson as the sectional coach of the year.
Apparently, he's skilled at coaching confidence into his swimmers.
Asked if he could go faster at state, Chiero didn't hesitate: "Yes - definitely."
Individual excellence: Fremd will be represented by juniors Dustin Anderson and Jeff Freund in the state prelims.
Anderson made it in both the 50 and 100 freestyles. Of the two, his better seed is in the 100, where he's the 17th-fastest qualifier.
And of his two races, Anderson prefers the 100 because, as he put it, "In the 50, one mistake and it's over."
Freund's goal all year has been to score points at the state meet, and he's got a great chance to do it. His sectional time in the 500 free (4:42.89) was the 11th fastest in the state, so if he's able to hold that position, he'll get Fremd on the scoreboard.
Fremd's senior divers, Brandon Trostrud and Mike Kowalenko, could also figure in the scoring picture. They placed 1-2 at the Stevenson sectional.
Family tradition: Buffalo Grove sophomore Ian Rodriguez's performances from the conference meet to the sectional were virtually identical, which is a good thing. He's clearly reached another level in his development, and he seems capable of reaching another one with a full taper reserved for the state meet.
It would take superlative efforts for him to score points in either the 200 IM or 100 backstroke, but it's certainly not impossible. Either way, it's especially impressive considering he wasn't even sure he wanted to swim in high school.
Though he's from a prominent family of swimmers - his sister, Erin, was a four-year BG standout - coach Jamie Klotz explained that as a freshman, Ian wasn't yet completely convinced swimming was right for him.
After a successful freshman year and a significant growth spurt following it, the wide smile on Rodriguez's face after the sectional meet suggests that he's happy with his decision.
They're back: Prospect senior Tyler Bengtsen has earned a third straight trip to the state meet in the 100 breaststroke, and coach Alfonso Lopez believes he's positioned well for a big swim in his final state meet opportunity. Joining him will be another Knights senior, Joe Lakner, racing in the 100 backstroke. Lakner competed with Prospect's relays at last year's state meet, but this is his first time as an individual . . . Schaumburg senior Ben Epperly will be among the competitors in the 500 freestyle.
agabriel@dailyherald.com