Neuqua Valley, Metea Valley get glimpse at bright futures
With a team loaded with young swimmers, Neuqua Valley surged to seventh place at the IHSA girls swimming meet at New Trier on Saturday.
The Wildcats finished highest among DuPage County schools and showed there is much promise for the future.
"There are always things you wish you could have back and always some pleasant surprises," Neuqua Valley coach Jason Niforatos said. "I think people were thinking that because we had a lot of freshmen that we were counting on, that would be kind of tricky, but they stepped up."
Neuqua Valley swam Tiffanie Ruan, Kristen Stege and Athena Salafatinos and Maxine Parkinson in the 200-yard medley relay and finished fourth. That same quartet finished third in the 200 freestyle relay.
Three freshmen - Rachel Stege, Ruan and Megan Ciezczak - teamed with Salafatinos and finished seventh in the 400 freestyle relay. Parkinson was 11th in the 200 IM and fourth in the 100 breaststroke while Ruan placed 10th in the 100 freestyle.
Rachel Stege finished 10th in the 500 freestyle.
"I'm super proud not only of how the girls navigated this meet to get to finals, but how they came back and did today. It was impressive," Niforatos said.
A similarly youthful Metea Valley team finished eighth. The Mustangs' 62-point total was 22 points better than the school had previously scored in the state finals.
"Once we got into the meet, things smoothed out and I think we're all really happy with how we did," Metea Valley freshman McKenna Stone said.
Stone finished fifth in the 50 freestyle and sixth in the 100 freestyle.
"My individual events were kind of rough," Stone said. "When you look at the history of this meet, it's really hard to drop time from prelims to finals. I'll be better next year because I'll know in advance."
Sophomore Laurel Bludgen, junior Rylee Stone, sophomore Kellie Willhite and McKenna Stone finished fifth in the 200 freestyle relay. Senior Anna Scovill joined with Bludgen, Willhite and McKenna Stone to finish sixth in the 400 freestyle relay. Willhite added an eighth-place finish in the 100 breaststroke.
"We have a lot of upperclassmen who are talented, but we have a lot of underclassmen who are talented too. That's going to help us in the next few years," McKenna Stone said.
The Glenbard West-South co-op was led by freshman Kate Morris, seventh in the 200 freestyle and third in the 100 freestyle.
"I was really tired today, but I'm happy with how I did considering that," Morris said. "This atmosphere makes it more fun and easier to come back. Even though I'm extremely happy, this is going to motivate me to do even better next year."
Morris teamed with sophomore Madi Field, junior Jane Denenberg and junior Megan Murphy to finish 10th in the 200 freestyle relay and lift the co-op to 14th in the team standings.
Hinsdale Central finished 11th after the 200 medley relay finished seventh, the 400 freestyle relay was ninth and Anna Gruvberger was sixth in the 100 butterfly. Naperville Central's 200 medley relay and 200 freestyle relay each finished eighth, and Lisa Johnson was 11th in the 100 backstroke.
Naperville North's Connie Zhang was eighth in the 100 backstroke.