St. Charles North in contention for top 5
On a day when St. Charles North showed it is ready to take a place in the Top 10 best boys swim programs in Illinois, some of the biggest smiles were reserved for the very last races in Friday’s state preliminaries.
First Joey Chokran sneaked into the 100-yard breaststroke finals, qualifying in 12th spot for today’s finals at New Trier. Then the North Stars 400 freestyle relay swam a solid prelim race and sweated for two heats before finding they had qualified in sixth place for the championship heat.
The rest of the day was a bit of mixed bag for the North Stars, who have all three relays swimming in addition to five individual swims. St. Charles won’t win the state title — that trophy was all but sealed by New Trier, which put itself in position to win its 21st state title. Defending champion Naperville Central will likely finish second based on the unofficial point totals had the meet been scored on Friday. Official totals are only kept on Saturday, but New Trier carries 217 “points” on-deck while Naperville Central has 172.
A dogfight looms for third place between Normal and Loyola. St. Charles North needs to swim better than its seeds on Saturday and those schools need to suffer some letdowns to contend for a trophy. But a top 10 and possibly a top five finish are still within the North Stars’ reach.
“We had lifetime best times in every race we swam today,” St Charles North coach Rooney said. “We had a very good meet. Like I said, we can’t control what other teams do. I think there are some things we need to improve on. But my hat’s off to these kids. We battled very well today.”
Pre-meet unofficial scoring showed the North Stars ranked first. And while he downplayed that, he knew his team had checked the “psych sheet” and was aware of that ranking.
“We had the weight of the world on our back, whether I wanted to hide it or not,” Rooney said. “Naperville Central and New Trier are the two best teams in the state. After that, there are maybe eight teams fighting right now.”
The North Stars have Chris Dieter swimming for the state title in the 200 freestyle and the 100 freestyle. Andrew Preusse swims in the consolation final of the 500 freestyle and Kyle Gannon competes in the consoles of the 500 freestyle. The North Stars’ 200 medley relay and 400 freestyle relay are also consolation finalalists.
But Rooney said he felt Chokran’s swim was “the swim of the day” and the junior was plenty happy about making his first high school individual final.
“It’s what I’ve been working for all fall,” Chokran said. “It’s what I wanted and it’s what I did. It’s an incredible feeling.”
St. Charles East, Marmion and Kaneland each have one swimmer still competing on Saturday.
For St. Charles East, that swimmer is Shaun Seuschek, who swims in the consoles of the 200 individual medley and the 100 butterfly.
“Today, I felt phenomenal,” Seuschek said. “I’m really looking forward to coming back for the first time ever. It should be an eye-opener.”
For Marmion, Ben Kanute swims in the consoles of the 500 freestyle.
“My 500 was pretty good,” Kanute said.. “I swam it pretty well, but I get another chance to do it tomorrow.”
Kaneland’s Grant Alef assured that he will finish his final state meet with a top six finish when he qualified for the championship finals of the 100 backstroke.