Boys swimming: Naperville Central wins Neuqua Valley sectional

Year after year, the District 203 and 204 high school boys swimming teams compete in  a sectional and send a large group from each school to the state meet.

Saturday's Neuqua Valley sectional was more of the same.

Naperville Central won the team title with 242 points. The hosts were second at 228, and Naperville North was third with 221. Waubonsie Valley was fourth at 185 and Metea Valley was sixth with 138.

The sectional team title is an impressive accomplishment, but it does not guarantee a swimmer or relay will qualify for the state meet. That has to be done by the swimmers themselves, and the District 203 and 204 athletes came through in a big way.

All five schools each qualified all three relays for this year's state meet that starts Friday at New Trier High School in Winnetka.

Four of the five schools qualified in at least six individual events, with some of the schools qualifying more than one swimmer in an event.

“This is an excellent sectional. One look at the number of state qualifiers and it's atypical from the rest of the state,” said Waubonsie Valley coach Nick Arens.

Naperville Central had four swimmers qualifying in two individual races. Michael Stern made it in the 200-yard freestyle and 500 freestyle; Will McDonald in the 200 individual medley and 100 backstroke, the latter of which he won; Andrew Dai in the 200 IM and 100 butterfly and Phillip Sajaev in the 50 freestyle and 100 breaststroke, both of which he won.

Other qualifiers for the Redhawks were Adam Kowalyshen in the 50 freestyle, Matt Wooten in the 100 butterfly, Ryan Smith in the 500 freestyle and Ben Russo in the 100 breaststroke.

“All our hard work paid off, the morning practices, the afternoon practices, the weight training,” McDonald said.

“We'll enjoy this tonight and get back to work on Monday,” said Naperville Central coach Mike Adams. “We'll try to finish strong at state. I give the boys a lot of credit.”

Neuqua's two double winners were Kyri Chen in the 200 IM and 100 backstroke and Jacob Cunningham in the 50 and 500 freestyle. A swimmer competing in both high school's shortest and longest event is usually rare, but Neuqua coach Chad Allen like Cunningham's start in the 50.

“I have competed in the 200 and 500 freestyles. But I had an amazing 50 at our senior night meet and they thought I had potential,” Cunningham said. “With the 50 it's more of a physical thing. With the 500 it's more of a mental thing.”

It was no surprise to any swimmer that Saturday's competition would be a challenge.

“We knew it would be tough. We didn't win (the team title). We almost caught (the Redhawks), but the important thing is to get to state and we have another week to focus on things,” Cunningham said.

Neuqua is also sending Sathya Subramanian (200 IM), Kevin Wu (100 butterfly), John Ruan (100 freestyle), Jack Hiss (500 freestyle) and Brandon Chelstrom (100 backstroke) to New Trier.

Three Naperville North swimmers reach state in two individual events apiece. Horace Qiao earned sectional titles in the 200 IM and 100 butterfly; Ethan Chuang qualified in the 200 IM and 100 breaststroke and Noah Ellis won the 100 freestyle and qualified in the 100 backstroke.

Brandon Chan made state in the 100 butterfly as did Josh Tak in the 100 breaststroke. Zach Richards won the diving competition held Saturday morning. Other divers from this sectional will make it to state if their scores are among the 32 top non-sectional winning marks.

Waubonsie left the meet with four double individual event qualifiers. Aayush Deshpande heads to state in the 200 freestyle and 500 freestyle; Jared Simpson in the 200 IM and 100 backstroke; Cole Steffl in the 50 freestyle and 100 breaststroke and Eric Weng in the 50 and 100 freestyles.

Bryan Ellig reached in the 100 breaststroke.

John Tjards was Metea's double individual qualifier earning state spots in the 50 and 100 freestyles. Teammate Sam Kastan also made it in the 50 freestyle as did Janssen Gamilla in the 100 butterfly and Connor Mitsch and Michael Chan in the 100 backstroke.

The Metea 400 freestyle relay of Max Chamberlain,  Mitsch,  Gamilla and  Tjards enjoyed the biggest time drop from their seed time of any relay, shaving just under 12 seconds and finishing in 3:13.33.

“It's an event that I switch guys in and out of during the year. I decided who would swim two events before it today and it paid off,” said Mustangs coach Mark Jager.

Benet's Andrew Prisby will represent the Redwings at state in the 50 freestyle.