L-S Girls Swim Team Finishes Second at State Meet

On Saturday the Lincoln-Sudbury girls Swim and Dive team, led by captains Emma Jarczyk, Catherine MacKeen, Leah McCabe and Alicia Perry, concluded their season at the Division One State Championships held at Springfield College. 

This is the meet that everyone has been working toward all year. Perry said, “Our team’s performance at states was a great representation of the hard work and dedication our team has put forth all season.”

The meet was high energy and filled with great and exciting swims by everyone involved.

The meet started off with the 200 medley relay. The team of Ann-Marie Billig, Caroline Hultin, MacKeen and McCabe came in sixth. Next, in the 200 freestyle, Perry scored in eleventh place.  Michela Eckhouse and Jenny Genovese also did very well, swimming personal best times.

In the 200 individual medley, MacKeen came in eighth.  Hultin also swam very well.  Katherine O’Shea and Ansley Baker made the podium placing second and third in the 50 freestyle.  They finished with very fast times of 24.21 and 25.14 respectively.  Caroline Thomas and McCabe also did well in the event.
Kim Yang, Emma Jarczyk and Clara Shealy all earned L-S points for diving, concluding a fantastic season.  They came in fourth, fifth and seventh respectively.  Jarczyk was very happy with the result saying, “as divers we all looked great and I couldn't imagine ending our season on a better note.”

MacKeen made the podium in sixth for the 100 butterfly with a time of 1:00.88.  Eckhouse did a personal best in the event as well.  O’Shea scored another second place finish in the 100 freestyle with a blazing time of 52.87.  Emily Huang, McCabe and Genovese also swam the event and they all improved upon their seed times.

Perry was the sole competitor for L-S in the 500 and she finished in eighth place with a time of 5:25.09.

The 200 freestyle relay was easily the closest and most exciting event of the meet.  It was a rematch of the Dual County League Championship race between L-S and Westford Academy that L-S barely won. This race was even closer, but the team of Perry, McCabe, Baker and O’Shea were able to come from behind again, taking the lead in the final 10 yards to out-touch Westford by 0.03 seconds with a fantastic time of 1:40.04.

In the 100 backstroke Caroline Goswami and Billig both swam great.  Goswami did her best time by over two seconds and scored in fifteenth place and earned points for the team. 

Baker then finished third in the 100 breaststroke with a time of 1:08.25.  Hultin, Eugenia Almandoz and Shannon Johnson also did very well and they all improved upon their seed times.

To conclude the meet, the team of Perry, MacKeen, Baker and O’Shea came in second in the 400 freestyle relay.

In the end, Lincoln-Sudbury finished second at the meet, which was won by a very strong team from Westford Academy.

It was a great way for L-S to end the season, and everyone was happy with the result.  MacKeen explains by saying, “I would say that the real win for the team was the way we worked together.  Everyone stepped up and performed their best for the benefit of their team, and had a blast doing so.”  McCabe added,

“We're one united team and we really showed everyone what we're capable of. We truly did go out with a bang!”

Even though this was the last meet for some great seniors, the outstanding performances by the underclassmen show a promising future for the L-S girls.

(Taylor Dawson submitted this report.)