Walking out holding hands with the other girls in their heat, screams fill their ears. The cheers of all the parents and students of all the swim teams represented is deafening. The swimmers make their way to the starting blocks, taking off their warm ups and shaking out their muscles.

Staring directly down at the water, waiting for the beep to sound so they can dive into the water.

“The atmosphere was very loud,” Trinity Sadecky ‘20 said. “Prelims were loud because only 16 swimmers made it back and finals were even louder, because of all the state records that were broken.”

This year the City Girls Swim (And Dive) Team got seventh overall at state, a big improvement from last year’s sixteenth place.

“I think it was a really good growing and learning experience for everyone,” Coach Jordan Huff said. “I thought our girls team did a really good job of rolling with the punches.”

One of these punches, Huff explained, was getting used to the new meet setup that included both preliminary and final swims. A sophmore on the team, Jesse Hausknecht-Brown, actually thought that this new setup was helpful.

“It is a good motivation for everyone,” Hausknecht-Brown said. “The times from state this year were significantly faster from last year’s times because people swim faster in a prelims-finals meet setup. They want to make finals, so they swim fast in prelims. ”

Grace Campion ’22, who has been to state in club swimming, was at a high school state for the first time. She swam anchor in the 400m free relay.

“It’s the same sort of thing except I felt more like a part of a team,” Campion said. “Everybody seemed to support each other and work together more.”

From City High, seven girls made it to state along with three alternates. All three of the relays, the 200m medley, 200m free relay, and the 400m free relay qualified, as well as a few swimmers in individual events. This was an important goal for Head Coach Zane Hugo this year and he would like to continue that for next year.

“Next year, I’d like to continue moving up the rankings at state. The girl’s goal at the beginning of the season was to finish higher at the state meet than the boys did and they tied the boys finish from the previous season. So I’d like to see whatever the boys end up this year  to be a goal for them again next year,” Hugo said. “The 200 medley relay was just a bit short of making the All American time, and I’d like to see that relay and another relay make that All American time and I think they’re all capable coming together as a team and doing that in another year.”

Hugo and Huff expressed the sad split of the team at the end of the season but they felt that the whole team did a great job this season.

“They were taking each opportunity and really seizing the moment and even when they didn’t quite meet their own expectations, they kept kept pushing through,” Huff said.