Once the Illinois High School Association decided to find a permanent home for the boys and girls state swimming and diving finals, and shift away from high school sites like New Trier and Evanston, coaches throughout the state were eager to see the state organization expand the list of qualifiers from Friday’s preliminaries to Saturday’s consolation and championship heats with more lanes available for competition at the FMC Natatorium in Westmont.
It took awhile, but it finally happened this year as the total was boosted from 12 to 16 qualifiers in each event. But all that did was encourage hopefuls to swim even faster in attempting to keep their seasons alive to the very last day.
Every lane was the fast lane again on Friday as Evanston fell short in its bid to send any individuals or relay teams to Saturday’s finals.
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Evanston’s seven individuals and three relay entries couldn’t keep pace, although the Wildkits did turn in some season best times before the competition was all over Friday.
“I wouldn’t say it was more disappointing because they expanded it,” said ETHS head coach Kevin Auger. “It’s disappointing any time you don’t make it to Saturday.
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“We still had target times we were shooting for (not places). But off the top of my head, and without looking at all the results, I think this year you have to go faster in most events to make the top 16. You could go slower last year and still make it into the top 12.
“Last year in the 400 (freestyle) relay we swam about as fast as we did today. Last year we were 14th (in the prelim swims) and this year we were 22nd. We would have had to break our school record to make it this year, that’s how much faster the state is.”
Evanston’s best bets on paper seemed to be in the 500-yard freestyle, where senior Lucas Macy and junior Jonas Nissan wound up in the same heat; the 100 backstroke that featured ETHS record holder Cadel Saszik; and both the 200 and 400 relay teams.
But Auger had to reshuffle the short freestyle relay when freshman Hunter Kleinschmit was sidelined after suffering a broken left wrist in a biking accident earlier in the week. His brother Will replaced him, but the Kit foursome of Evan Lindner, Kleinschmit, Isaac Peng and Max Taufen managed a time of 1 minute, 26.91 seconds that ranked only 20th among the prelim challengers and was a half second off the last time needed to advance.
In the 400 relay, the unit of Taufen, Lindner, Saszik and Henry Chapon turned in a time of 3:10.81, 22nd among the challengers and two seconds too slow to earn the right to keep competing.
Evanston’s other relay squad ranked 21st in the 200 medley with a time of 1:35.06 behind Saszik, Harry Winefield, Macy and Taufen.
Both Macy (4:41.61 for 23rd) and Nissan (4:45.10 for 27th) recorded season best times in the longest race of the day, the 500, but didn’t really threaten the top 16.
Also representing the Wildkits were Taufen, tie for 32nd in the 50 freestyle in 21.67; Macy, 42nd in the 100 butterfly in 52.16; Lindne, 41st in the 100 freestyle in 47.80; and Saszik, 24th in the 100 backstroke in 52.27.
Senior Mo Frischer was eliminated in the diving prelims with a score of 148.70 points.
“We were playing a game of inches today, and we had our ups and downs,” said Auger. “I was really happy with those two 500 swims, and I thought all of our seniors finished out the best that they could.
“We had to give everything we had just to make it here and then we had to do even better to make it to Saturday. We just couldn’t do it.”
