St. Charles North wins final event to claim sectional title

It came down to the last 25 yards of the final race of Saturday's St. Charles East boys swimming sectional, but when St. Charles North's Joe Myhre touched the wall ahead of DeKalb's Daniel Hein, the North Stars were sectional champions.

You can say what you want about the sectional title being an "empty championship" because it does not enhance the North Stars' chances at next week's state finals in New Trier. But don't use any of that "empty" talk around St. Charles North's team, because they knew they had to step up and race to win Saturday's meet at the Norris Center, and racing is what the swimming postseason is all about.

"To be honest with you, this is probably the sweetest sectional championship I've had, with either boys or girls," North Stars coach Rob Rooney said. "We needed it. The boys needed it. The program needed it. They've been a group of guys who very few people had faith in except themselves and the coaching staff and their parents."

Powering the North Stars were their three relays. The 200-yard medley relay of Stephan Hutchinson, Chris Stanek, Nate Bawolek and Ben Sherman finished fourth and swam faster than the state qualifying time.

The other two North Stars relays were sectional champions. The 200 freestyle relay of Hutchinson, Joe Myhre, Bawolek and Sherman edged St. Charles East - with both schools qualifying for the state finals.

The same four North Stars swam the 400 freestyle relay, with Myrhe anchoring the team to victory. By winning that race, the North Stars claimed the sectional title, and the noise at the Norris Center increased with every leg and reached a crescendo near the end of Myhre's leg.

"The first 75 (yards), I couldn't hear much of anything," Myhre said. "But the last 25, when I pushed off and I kind of had the lead, I heard everyone going crazy, and it really got the adrenaline flowing."

Myhre won his two individual races as well, the 50 freestyle and the 100 freestyle. Hutchinson was second in the 50 freestyle.

"This is the biggest underdog team I've had that's got the ability to do something," Rooney said. "I've never had sprinters. I've always had stroke swimmers or distance guys, D-hogs. But I've got sprinters now and I've had to change a lot of how I do training to work with these guys."

A junior, Myhre qualified in two relays and two individual events in 2014, though he only scored with the North Stars 200 freestyle relay.

"My No. 1 priority was to get to state next week," Myhre said. "I wasn't going to go for any pool records or anything. I wanted to score points for the team and qualify in my events."

Rooney said two swims stood out to him, and both were near-misses. The first was Caymus Cairns' 500-yard freestyle. From a seed time of 5:00.85, Cairns swam 4:47.63 and finished second to St. Charles East's Nick Boryk. Cairns missed qualifying by 1 second, but the time drop energized the North Stars midway through the meet.

"He was 5:45 a year ago and he's a minute faster this year," Rooney said. "The team got excited about how he did."

The second was Ben Sherman's 100 freestyle, where he swam 48.08 and narrowly missed qualifying.

"We had a lot of near-misses today, now that I think of it," Rooney said. "I'm excited about how we swam. I'm really excited about the guys with bald heads, the guys who tapered for this meet, because they won the meet for us today."

St. Charles East finished third behind the North Stars and DeKalb and had a solid meet. In addition to all three relays, the Saints qualified five individual entries for the state finals.

"We like being in the battle the whole way, right there to the end," St. Charles East coach Joe Cabel said. "It was a great sectional, not just for the Saints or North or Wheaton or DeKalb. We had a great atmosphere all day today, and we had great teams and some really great swimmers here."

Boryk won the 200 freestyle and the 500 freestyle; Mitch Milosch and John Cranfill finished third and fourth, respectively, in the 100 butterfly and John Tarpey was fourth in the 100 backstroke.

"Cranfill was on fire today and those guys on the 400 free relay swam great," Cabel said. "Mitch Milosch is a freshman and he was all over today with great swims. He was ready to go. Across the board, everybody swam awesome."

Boryk powered to both his individual event victories. He swam 1:42.92 in the 200 freestyle and won by more than 2 seconds over DeKalb's Dylan Powers. In the 500 freestyle, Boryk swam 4:42.52 and won by 5 seconds over St. Charles North's Cairns.

"Even though I wasn't tapered, I felt great," Boryk said. "It was great with all the guys showing up from the conference meet who weren't swimming today here to cheer us on. We even had (Nick) Wellman come back from last year's team to give his support, and that was nice."

Boryk is a sophomore who qualified in both the 200 freestyle and the 500 freestyle as a freshman. He is already 5 seconds faster in each of his events than he was at the 2014 prelims, where he failed to advance.

"Knowing that you're going to do even better at state is an amazing feeling," Boryk said.

The Saints relays performed well on Saturday. The 200 medley relay of Tarpey, Nick Milosch, Mitch Milosch and Cranfill finished fourth. The 200 freestyle relay of Mitch Milosch, Boryk, Tarpey and Cranfill finished second to St. Charles North. The 200 freestyle relay quartet swam the 400 free relay and finished third.

"The kids we shaved for today had 100 percent lifetime bests, which was awesome to see," Cabel said. "We left a little bit on the relays for those guys next week, so we're looking forward to seeing them rested and shaved and ready to go next weekend."