Swimming: Laguna earns first CIF swim title
Saturday turned out to be quite a memorable day for the Laguna Beach High boys’ and girls’ swimming team.
For the first time in program history, Laguna captured a CIF Southern Section championship. The Breakers won the Division 2 boys’ team title at the CIF-SS Swimming and Diving Championships at the Riverside Aquatics Complexon the Riverside City College campus.
Laguna finished with a team score of 219 points in the boys’ Division 2 standings and finished in front of runner-up Murrieta Valley (181 points) and third-place Redlands (147) at Saturday’s finals.
In the girls’ Division 2 team competition, Laguna placed 16th among 40 teams in a division won by Crean Lutheran.
The boys’ title came as a surprise to the Breakers, who had moved up to Division 2 from Division 3 for the 2015 season.
Last year, the Laguna boys finished in second place, and the girls 12th place in Division 3.
“Moving up to Division 2 definitely made it a greater challenge for our swimmers to qualify for CIF,” said Beth Weber, co-head coach of the Breakers along with Kari Damato.
Nathan McConnell and Albie Beeler also are part of the Laguna coaching staff.
“Given the more competitive time standards to qualify, I’m incredibly proud of my swimmers for making time cuts in so many events,” Weber said. “We started the season off not even really considering a CIF Division 2 title, but both the boys and girls swam their hearts out and the girls made it in to finals in a relay and two events, a huge accomplishment for our team and the boys left with a historical win.
“It was a special day for the Laguna Beach swim team.”
The Laguna boys’ team at Saturday’s finals, seniors Cade Baldridge, Nolan del Toro, Jack Dodson and Erik Juliusson, juniors Cameron Karkosa and Max Morgan, and sophomore Billy Renner, established five school records at the CIF meet.
New marks were set in the 200 medley relay (1 minute 34.38 seconds), 200 free relay (1:27.66), 400 free relay (3:05.75), by Morgan in the 100 breaststroke (57.75), and Juliusson in the 200 individual medley (1:48.16).
Junior Ben Greenwood was part of the boys’ CIF team and swam the 200 and 500 free events at prelims.
Other key individual performances played a “huge role” in winning the title, Weber said. In addition to a second-place finish in the 200 IM, Juliusson placed third in the 100 backstroke (50.43). Morgan, third in the breaststroke, was seventh in the 200 IM (1:55.41). Karkoska took fifth in 200 IM (1:52.94) and also was fifth in the 100 breaststroke (58.39), and Baldridge was 11th in the 50 freestyle (21.77).
The Laguna boys’ 200 medley relay team was Juliusson, Karkoska, Morgan and Del Toro, which took second at finals. The 200 free relay team of del Toro, Renner, Dodson and Baldridge, placed seventh, each swimming their fastest 50 free splits, Weber said. The 400 free relay team of Karkoska, Morgan, Baldridge and Juliusson, capped the team’s exceptional performance by winning the event.
“It’s pretty sweet,” Juliusson, who will attend Purdue University, said of winning the CIF title. “We really didn’t expect it to happen, though.
“Going up a division after finishing second in Division 3 last year, we knew we could compete, but the competition would be different and tougher. We did well in league dual meets and as we got closer and closer to CIF, we realized we had a good shot. Once prelims were done, we knew we could score enough points to win the title.”
Weber said the boys’ prelims performance paved the way for a solid chance at a championship Saturday.
“The boys swam exceptionally well in prelims,” she said. “All three relays made it in to the championship finals (top nine) which gives the opportunity for the most points. This is really what gave the boys the opportunity to go for the title in finals. The fact that all three relays made it in gave us a huge opportunity to score points since relays are worth double the points of individual events.
“We knew we were going in to finals with a good chance of winning, but Coach Kari (Damato) and I told the boys that anything could happen and to focus on performing well and staying safe on the relay starts to avoid being disqualified and losing out on those points all together. On Saturday, when it came down to it, they delivered.”
The Laguna girls’ team, juniors Abby Cohn and Mia Salvini, and freshmen Harper Dix, Kasey Karkosa, Sophia Lucas and Kyla Whitelock, performed strongly at the Division 2 prelims. The Breakers made the consolation finals of the 200 medley relay Saturday with the foursome of Dix, Cohn, Karkoska and Whitelock. At finals, the team swam a new best time of 1:53.70, good for 15th place.
Karkoska made it to the championship final in two events. She placed fifth in the 100 butterfly (56.75), and fourth in the 100 backstroke (57.12).
Competing at prelims but not advancing to Saturday’s finals, Cohn, Lucas, Salvini, and Whitelock swam the 200 free relay, Karkosa, Cohn, Lucas and Dix the 400 free relay, and Dix swam the 100-yard butterfly and 100-yard backstroke.
Laguna divers, the freshman tandem of Liv Mitchell and Mackenzie Peasley, started the Breakers’ run at the CIF competition by coming up with big performances May 11 in the girls’ Division 2 diving competition. Mitchell (469 points) earned a second-place finish, and Peasley (339.15) placed 17th. Senior Raina Brommer (482.55) of ML King won the Division 2 diving title.
“Our girls did a great job,” Weber said. “We just didn’t have the numbers, the depth this year, as we have in the past. For the numbers we did have, the girls were excellent. Making the consolation finals in the 200 medley, and Kasey (Karkosa) getting to the finals Saturday, was really great.”
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Twitter: @MikeSciacca