Girls swimming: Kuehn, Fremd race to MSL title

A year from now, Fremd senior Katie Kuehn will swim for the Missouri Tigers.

On Saturday, she was a tiger in the water at the Prospect Natatorium, which hosted the Mid-Suburban League girls swimming meet.

Kuehn's powerful performance included first-place finishes in the 50 and 100-meter events, and contributions to the Vikings' first-place 200 and 400-yard freestyle medleys to help lead Fremd to the MSL crown.

Coach Andrew Kittrell's Vikings won the meet with 286.5 points ahead of Hersey (220.5), Schaumburg (196), Buffalo Grove (178) and host Prospect (109) to round out the top five.

It was Fremd's first title since 2014, which was Kittrell's fifth year directing the program. He also won titles in 2012 and 2013.

"It's awesome winning as a team, especially because it's my senior year," said Kuehn, who plans to study chemical engineering at Missouri. "I got to end on a really good note. It's super exciting."

Another super performance was turned in by Vikings junior Que Genet, who defended her diving championship with a pool record of 484.40.

Genet, who did gymnastics until she began diving in fifth grade, is the first Viking in Kittrell's 15 years to win back-to-back diving titles.

"It's really nice to win two in a row," said Genet, who was second as a freshman. "I'm really happy and proud of myself. For the most part it was just trying to stay positive and not overthink anything. I was talking to all my friends that I had in the meet and that helped me stay positive."

Genet placed ninth in the state final as freshman and third last fall.

"Donna O'Brien (Fremd diving coach) is a hall of famer (member of the Palatine High School hall of fame)" Kittrell said. "So I am so spoiled. I have a wonderful staff. My assistants Kristen and Brian Newby have been with me for all 15 years. I can't do any of this without my staff."

With their assistance, Kittrell said his swimmers have grown leaps and bounds this fall.

"And Katie and Que represent very well," he added. "But the fun part is that all our swimmers are great kids. It was a team effort in the sense that we had a lot of kids step up in events that aren't normally their normal event. This is a hard meet to win. The MSL has done a real nice job over the last few years. It's been very competitive.

"There is going to be a great series of kids who qualify in the next week and half but this (winning the MSL meet) has to be a whole team thing. You don't win a conference without all your kids. Our little butterflyer (sophomore Naishadha Gopu) wasn't expected to take any points and she was sixth (100-yard). That was huge."

The events on Saturday began with Fremd winning the 200-yard medley. Kuehn, sophomore Noora Nahlawi, senior Kate Berls and sophomore Emeline Lee stopped the timer in 1:51.22 over Hersey (1:53.08) with freshman Claudia Glinko, freshman Franchesca Sibayan, junior Andrea Teves and junior Pepper Schultz.

Buffalo Grove's Ella Houston won the 200-yard freestyle (1:53.74) over Fremd's Elizabeth Patla (1:53.72).

The 200-yard individual medley went to Schaumburg's Annabel Banicz (2:13.08) over Palatine's Yugene Shin (2:15.18).

Kuehn's time of 23.90 was a pool record in the 50 free as she defeated runner-up Zuzanna Krasnicki (24.24).

Hoffman Estates' Lena Banaszewski won the 100-yard butterfly (59.08) while Kuehn won the 100-yard free with a time of 52.7 over Krasnicki (52.86).

Houston also came home first in the 500 free. Clocked in 5:03.05, she topped runner-up Patla (5:07.58).

Schaumburg's Krasnikci, Diana Bobiv, Veronika Mieczkowski and Banicz took the 200-yard free relay (1:39.79) over Hersey's Freedom Toll, Abigail Stonequist, Victoria Wrona and Schultz (1:541.09).

Shin (58.28) won the 100-yard backstroke over Schaumburg's Nina Gwin (1:01.42) while Nahlawi (1:06.91) came home first in the 100-yard breaststroke over Buffalo Grove's Gianna Gagliano (108.13).

In the final event of the day, Fremd posted a pool record in the 400-yard free relay (3:35.94) as Kuehn, Patla, Anna Hinshaw and Erica Myers stopped the timer ahead of Schaumburg's Banicz, Bobiv, Krasnicki and Jalia Kacsh (3:41.25).

Fremd's 400 free relay triumph marked Kuehn's fourth trip to the winner's circle.

"I don't think that has ever happened at Fremd," Kittrell said. "Katie is the most successful swimmer we've ever had. Katie finished third in the 50 last year and that is the highest state finisher we've had in a swimming event."

Kuehn was also the MSL 50 and 100 champ the last two years.

"The individual races were definitely a goal but in the relays, I had a lot of help," Kuehn said. "I thought we could win them and we did. It's super exciting, not something that happens every day."

Something that does happen often is Hersey winning MSL East titles.

The Huskies won their 12th in 15 years (Prospect won two and BG the other) under coach Dick Mortensen, whose Huskies won the MSL crown in 2021.

"We just kind of go about our business. We are a blue collar crew, we don't have a lot of first place finishers but we pick up a ton of points throughout the meet."

"Congrats to Fremd," said Mortensen, who has won a combined 32 MSL East titles as a head boys and girls swimming coach and head boys and girls water polo coach in the league. "They swam phenomenally today.

"Our relay teams did an excellent job with two seconds and a fourth. Our freshman (Stonequist) did phenomenal in the 200 (free) and 500 (free) and the two relays. We are really concentrating on the sectional."