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Wheaton dives into sectional success

One of the best things to happen to the Wheaton Warrenville co-op's swimmers at Saturday's St. Charles East sectional happened long before they took to the water.

Saturday morning, Wheaton's divers, Luke Cooperman and Isaac Miller, finished first and third, respectively, with Cooperman scoring 511.10 over his 11 dives.

"We started the day with such a great performance from our divers, and that got everybody excited," Wheaton coach Jacob Ayers said. "I don't think anybody saw that coming from both those guys, and that got everybody fired up."

Wheaton finished fourth in the sectional, where 28 points separated the top four teams. St. Charles North won the meet with DeKalb and St. Charles East finishing second and third, respectively.

"We had some good swims all the way through," Wheaton co-op coach Jacob Ayers said. "A couple of the guys haven't tapered yet, so hopefully they'll go faster next week."

Powering Wheaton were a pair of seniors, Max St. George and Matt Rogers. St. George won the 200 IM and the 100 backstroke while Rogers was second in the 100 freestyle and third in the 100 backstroke.

"Coming into this meet, we had a lot of guys who felt they had chances to make the state meet," Rogers said. "We have a lot of great guys on the team, and it's been so much fun swimming with them through the season. Now we have a great group of guys going to state."

Wheaton had other sectional qualifiers, including the 200 medley relay and the 400 freestyle relay, and Evan Sheriff qualified in the 100 backstroke.

"(Sheriff) has battled a lot of illness in the past year, and he really came through," Ayers said. "He started things off for us on the medley and lit a fire under everybody."

Overall, Wheaton has a strong contingent headed to New Trier for next weekend's state finals.

"We've probably had more qualifiers in the past, but this is our best quality group of guys," Ayers said.

West Chicago-Batavia gained a state qualifier in freshman Garret Clasen, who finished second in the 200 IM and was third in the 100 breaststroke.

"Our team swam really well today, and unfortunately, I was the only one who qualified," Clasen said. "It was fun. I'm expecting myself to improve my times next weekend."

Clasen said he was half-rested for Saturday's sectional, and he will finish his taper prior to next weekend's finals.

"He's a freshman and he knew this was the expectation and he met it," West Chicago coach Nicole Cleveland said.

West Chicago-Batavia finished fifth in a competitive sectional.

"We missed on a few cuts as a team," Cleveland said. "We just had three freshmen swim on the 400 free relay. It's a young group of guys on the team. I hope they got to see what a sectional meet is like and that they'll feed off (Clasen's) success and know that we're raising the bar."

In every boys state meet, there are only a handful of freshmen, so Clasen is already unique in qualifying.

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