The time The time (May 04, 2005)to swim fast has arrived

League meets will provide tuneups before next week's CCS finals

by Keith Peters

The first half of the prep swim season is over. That means only one thing: no more long, early morning workouts. Or, in Palo Alto's case, no more late-evening practices.

All the preliminaries are over. The next two weeks are what everyone has been working toward. League championships are at stake this week, with the Central Coast Section finals on the starting blocks May 13-14 at Stanford.

Once again, it's time for the swimming soap operas.

"It will be really interesting to see who's preparing for CCS and who's deciding to shave and taper and go all out at the league meet and give up CCS," said Danny Dye, the first-year head coach at Palo Alto.

Said Gunn coach Mark Hernandez: "I don't know how it's going to turn out, but I know that it's going to be the fastest league meet in the past eight years."

Dye and Hernandez will have their teams knocking heads Friday at Saratoga High in the SCVAL De Anza Division finals at 2 p.m. The Gunn boys are defending champions, as are the Paly girls.

In the Peninsula Athletic League Bay Division finals at Burlingame High on Saturday at 1 p.m., there are all kinds of scenarios, as well.

The Menlo-Atherton girls won the dual-meet title with a 7-0 record and only need to finish ahead of runnerup Menlo to win the overall crown. The Knights, however, lost their dual meet with M-A by a mere six points and without a key swimmer - Kiki Hiller.

In the boys' meet, regular-season champion Menlo is a heavy favorite, "As long as things go as planned - no disqualifications, decent swims - it should be solid for us," said Menlo coach Terence O'Malley.

Over in the West Catholic Athletic League, Sacred Heart Prep has its hands full with Bellarmine (boys) and Mitty and Valley Christian (girls). The Gators will have an opportunity to focus on individual events while preparing for CCS.

Bottom line this week: The league meets should be very fast and the competition fierce. Depth will play a role, as will diving. A few of the meets could come down to who wins the relays.

"I'm looking forward to an exciting meet," said Palo Alto's Dye, who last season spent his time trying to beat the Vikings as the Los Altos head coach. Now, Dye is in the driver's seat with teams that won dual-meet titles with 6-0 records while finishing 8-0 overall.

"I think they need to know that their destiny is their hands," Dye said of his squads, which had to train at Stanford in the evening this season while a new pool is under construction. "They need to take that pride and go after it."

The Paly girls have won the past two league championships and nine since 1992. During that time, the Vikings are 107-6 in dual meets. If there is a lock for any girls' team this week, it's Paly.

Senior Monika Friedman is the only returning champion in two events 200 the 200 free and 500 free. She's got plenty of talent around her in seniors Remy Champion and Brittany Webster, juniors Donna Kremer, Phoebe Champion and Becky Wenzlau, sophomores Louisa Zuo and freshman standout Liv Jensen. The Vikings lead the league in all three relays, as well.

"Palo Alto is still the favorite in the girls' division," said Gunn's Hernandez. "We know that our girls lcan compete with them in every event. Swimmer for swimmer, we match up well, but their depth is their strength and makes them difficult to overcome."

The Gunn girls lost two of their top divers to injury, but will be represented there nonetheless. Di Eaton and Sera Garrison are among the veterans and sophomore Ariel Baugh will contribute, but the key to the Titans' hopes rest with a talented freshman class that includes Casey Barnes-Waychus, Naomi Glassman, Katie Reeves and Tara Levens.

As for the boys?

"I was sure Palo Alto was the sure favorite for the boys," Hernandez said, "but Monta Vista put on one of the best dual-meet displays that I've ever seen (in a 114-79 thumping of Gunn). Monta Vista is better than they've been since I've been coaching at Gunn. At the very least, they are in the running for the league title."

In order to the Gunn boys to defend, they have to win the league finals and have Palo Alto finish behind Monta Vista.

Palo Alto has one returning league champ in sophomore IMer Peter Lo. The Vikings also have seniors Jeremy Goldstein and Alec Goldfield, juniors Mike Sorgenfrei, Gregor Horstmeyer and Edward Morrison, plus sophomores Leland and Justin Takamine and Tyler Thompson. Morrison is new to the team this season and will play a huge role in the Vikings' title hopes because opposing him will be Mountain View's Tyler Landrith and Connor McColl of Los Altos. In the 200 free, for example, all three are under 1:47.00.

Gunn will be led by seniors Ysbrand Nusse, ChinChin Hu, Nick Rouse and Anthony Young, plus underclassmen Matt and Mark Prior plus Kyle Gertridge.

"Our boys perform better when they're underdogs," Hernandez said. "And we definitely are playing that role in the league meet."

The Menlo boys won't be playing that role in the PAL meet, however. They swamped their competition during a 7-0 dual-meet season.

"The boys look pretty solid," said O'Malley, who guided his squad to last season's overall title by just 13 points. "We have a lot of guys on the edge of CCS cuts, so that will be the exciting thing to look at for the guys, as will trying to get nice seed times for our relays for CCS."

The Menlo boys' lineup reads much like its water polo team - seniors Dave Bar-Gadda and Alex Seipp, juniors Dietrich Graumann, Peter Howard, Matt Hudnall, Kyle Hudson, Travis Read, and Matt Wilson; plus sophomore Ben Hohl.

Read should produce big points in the 100 back and 100 fly in addition to swimming relay legs. Depth will play an important role for the Knights this weekend.

As for the defending champion Menlo girls, they have less depth but plenty of talent with seniors Maryann Hiller and Kelsey Haley, junior Angie McPhaul plus sophomores Kiki Hiller, Whitney Allen, Megan Burmeister, Kim Krueger and Camy Sullivan.

"Again (as in years past), I think a majority of the meet will be determined in the "lower" seeded kids and the B relays," O'Malley said. "M-A has a lot of girls and can enter four in each event. We do not have that many girls, so the ones we have will have to do some amazing stuff to outscore M-A. Other schools will play a pretty big part in the meet, as well."

Burlingame has a number of individuals who can break up the points. For that reason, M-A coach Rick Longyear looks for Menlo to defend.

"The PAL meet will indeed be different," said Longyear, comparing it to the dual-meet season. "First, having all eight schools present changes things considerably.

"Menlo will have fewer swimmers scoring points than us, but their average finish looks to be higher: a talent versus depth competition."

The Bears, who last won a league championship in 1997 when girls' swimming was held in the spring for the first time, have their best (and first undefeated) team since then. The junior class leads the way with Kelly Eaton, Danielle Hildebrandt and Heidi Kucera. Hildebrandt is the defending champ in the 200 IM. Not only will those three compete for six individual titles, but their presence on the relays could make the difference between winning the league crown or losing it.

Longyear, however, knows it will take more than that.

"All 16 (M-A) swimmers need to produce for us to have a chance to win, not just our CCS scoring athletes," he said.

Juniors Colleen Cleary and Kelly Fero plus freshman Elena Kadvany also will play key roles for the Bears.

In the boys' division, it "looks like a cakewalk for Menlo - way more depth and talent than any other PAL team," said Longyear, who looks to seniors Michael Borcich, Torr Hage and sophomores Peter Jacobs and Robbie Eaton to lead the way.

In the WCAL finals on Saturday at Bellarmine Prep in San Jose, Sacred Heart Prep will look to gain more CCS qualifying times while searching for individual honors.

On the boys' side, sophomore Kameron Flores-Maxfield will be out to lower his CCS-leading time of 1:00.36 in the 100 breast while freshman Alex Navarro will test Bellarmine's talent and depth in the 200 and 500 freestyles. Randy Ang will go in the 50 and 100 free, Douglas Wigley looks solid in the 200 IM and 100 breast while the Gators' 200 medley relay team will be out to improve upon its No. 2 CCS time of 1:42.20.

"On the girls' side, the WCAL is really strong this year and, after years of Mitty dominance, it should be an interesting meet," said SHP coach Kevin Morris. "While we won't be able to win it, we're focusing on a few things."

Individually, Tiffany Yim (200 IM, 100 back) and Katie Sutherland (500 free) should contain for titles while Megan Maurano (100 breast) is close to the school record.

For the Gators, as well as for all the other local teams, this weekend will provide an important step closer to the CCS meet. This is what everyone has been working toward this season - to swim fast.

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