Sports

Evanston Qualifies 3 Relays, 7 Individuals for State Swim Meet

Evanston advanced three relays and captured seven individual qualifying berths en route to a fourth place team finish at the Glenbrook South Sectional meet Saturda

Submitted by ETHS Sports Information.

It took less than a minute --- 53.84 seconds to be exact --- for Ana Woods to turn a good day for the Evanston girls swimming and diving team into a great day.

Woods’ anchor leg in the 400-yard freestyle relay helped the Wildkits qualify all three relay teams for the Illinois High School Association state finals for the first time since 2009. Overall, Evanston advanced three relays and captured seven individual qualifying berths en route to a fourth place team finish at the Glenbrook South Sectional meet Saturda

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Woods stepped up in the anchor leg of the 200 freestyle and 400 freestyle relay races, the first time the diminutive sophomore has assumed that kind of burden in a championship meet in her young swim career. For good measure, she swam the breaststroke leg in the medley and added a fourth place finish in the 100-yard breaststroke (1:05.34).

Her 53.84 anchor leg came less than 10 minutes after her breaststroke finish as the ETHS all-sophomore quartet of Iana Wolff, Honore Collins, Paige Haden and Woods slipped under the IHSA state qualifying standard with a fifth place time of 3:36.22. That performance secured Evanston’s fourth place finish in the 14-team field with 164 points, behind only defending state champion New Trier (275), Loyola Academy (243) and Glenbrook South (180).

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Both Woods and Wolff sacrificed potential qualifying in individual races for the good of the relay teams. Woods was switched out of the 50-yard freestyle race by head coach Kevin Auger even though she had qualified for State in that event as a freshman.

The move paid off as Woods was clocked in 29.22 in the medley and 23.72 in the short relay prior to her fantastic finish in the last two events.

“It was definitely different today, going from the breaststroke to the 400 relay like that,” said Woods once she finally caught her breath. “I understood why Coach wanted to do this, but I wasn’t sure it would work, because last year I swam three relays and we didn’t qualify in two of them.

“I was really proud of the whole team and the way we swam today. We were really motivated and we did a lot better than we did last year. That was my best time in the medley by over a second, and this was a really good meet for me. That last relay was all about how much I really wanted it, and I really wanted to go to State in all four races. Swimming anchor like that motivates me to do a lot better. I work pretty well under pressure.”

“We looked at swimming her in the 50 free, and said if she gets a good enough time to score some points, she could probably do that for the relay, too,” said Auger. “Iana was under the state cut in the 50, too. Individually they’re both good --- but together they showed they can do great things. We felt the 400 was the toughest relay for us to get through, and we needed both of them to do it.

“Ana was the only one who was under the state cut coming in, and most of the girls swam well under the state cuts today. It’s so great to have all of those sophomores qualify for State. I hope they saw what they’re capable of, what the future can be for them.”

Woods teamed with  Collins, Wolff and senior Rosselyn Lopez for a third place showing in 1:46.18 in the medley relay, and in the 200 freestyle relay the ETHS unit of Wolff, Lopez, Woods and junior Millie Rosen earned runnerup honors with a time of 1:37.41, behind only champ Glenbrook South’s pool record of 1:35.95.

Providing individual highlights were qualifiers Collins, Lopez, Wolff, Haden and diver Katie Budde.

Collins broke a pair of sophomore school records, blazing to third in the 200 individual medley in 2:09 flat and coming back to place fifth in the 100 backstroke in 58.05. Her IM time marked a drop of more than four seconds from her previous best, and in the backstroke she broke the sophomore mark set by former ETHS state champion Jane Munro.

Lopez, who missed out on a state trip in the breaststroke as a junior by less than a second after qualifying as a sophomore, made sure this time around even though her seed time didn't place her in the championship heat. So she won her heat in 1:06.80, more than a second under the IHSA cut, and placed seventh overall. Nine individuals qualified out of that event.

Wolff just missed a sectional title in the 100 butterfly when she couldn’t find the wall at the finish after leading most of the race. She took second in 56.99 as Loyola’s Maria Jardeleza earned the title in 56.90.

Like Lopez, Haden qualified out of a slower heat in the backstroke with a career best time of 58.43. She won her heat and claimed seventh overall.

 Budde advanced for the second straight year in the diving competition, but didn’t have to stress --- much --- about accounting for one of the 32 statewide at-large berths available to divers who weren’t sectional champions.

Budde bested diving coach Aaron Melnick’s pre-meet target score of 370 points with a fifth place total of 376 points for her 11 dives, and then like most diving hopefuls spent the rest of the day trying to track scores from other sectionals on the Internet.

“Last year I didn’t find out I made it until about 7 o’clock at night, but now I think I’m OK,” Budde said. “I really wanted to get 380 just to be safe.

“I had a good start today and I usually have to have a good start to stay relaxed. I did what I needed to do today, but I didn’t show my absolute best.”

Budde’s good start included a score of 42.90 on her second dive, a back flip one and a half twist. “That’s my favorite dive. I did twist it a little too much, but it still felt pretty good,” she said. “I was a little nervous about it, but I got 6s and 5 and a halfs, so that was pretty good.”

Budde’s six-dive total of 225.55 represented a career-best for the junior standout, just one week after she put together her best 11 dive performance at the conference meet.

The two-day IHSA state finals open Friday at New Trier High School.


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