Spartans rule again in the Big Eight

Congratulations to the Madison Memorial Spartans, who this past week wrapped up their fifth consecutive Big 8 title with a win over Madison East 106-64. Memorial becomes the third team in the history of the conference to win five straight titles, following the 10-year run of the Spartans starting in 1970 and Madison West in the 1980s.

See this wrap-up from the Wisconsin State Journal:

http://host.madison.com/sports/high-school/swimming/article_4cb3d1fc-bdfc-11de-8edd-001cc4c002e0.html

While Memorial winning a conference title may induce a few yawns -- the program has long been one of the state's elites, and winning state titles is usually THE season goal -- it's still worthy of attention. The Big 8 has gotten much more competitive in recent years, with the emergence of East as a state power and the move of traditionally strong Verona from the Badger over to the Big 8.

And as most coaches will tell you, maintaining excellence in a program is not the piece of cake it may look like to outsiders. As a perennial champ, you're almost always everyone's biggest duel meet of the season. And in a large program like Memorial, freshmen and even sophomores often have to bide their time before making an impact on the varsity squad and swimming on the A relays. At most squads around Wisconsin, solid freshman can come in and start swimming varsity right away; not necessarily so at Memorial. Coach Jason Verhelst has to balance a fine line between maintaining interest among younger swimmers and stoking the competitive fires of a squad that's often three deep in quality swimmers per event.

So hat's off to Verhelst and his Memorial squad, which lost a bunch of solid seniors from last year's team. It's an accomplishment worth noting.