Clipping along to victory -- D2 state meet recap

Give credit where it's due -- of the five D2 teams seeded to finish within 33 points of each other before the night began, Sturgeon Bay/Sevastopol swam the best all meet long, and came away deservedly with its first state championship.

The win was a sweet one for a Clippers team that came in with high hopes for a top finish at last year's state meet, only to end up 14th. The team swam great all year -- in all candor, consistently posting the best times of D2 teams throughout the year -- and the key question coming into Friday night: Could they bring it for the big meet? They did, in flying colors, in a tightly contested meet that wasn't settled until the meet-ending 400 free relay.

Of course, it helps when you add a freshman to your squad the caliber of Savanna Townsend. It was truly a team effort on SB/S's part -- they qualified nine individuals, and had six swimmers participating on their three relays -- but Savanna Townsend stood out during the meet. She won the 50 free, finished a close second in the 100 free, anchored the team's record-breaking 200 free relay with a scintillating 23.14 split (the fastest of the night in the event by more than half-a-second), and secured the first-place trophy with a 51.77 anchor leg on the 400 free relay that clinched 6th place in the relay and the team's 15-point win over three-time defending champs DeForest.

"Savanna's been a championship swimmer for a long time," said a dripping wet head coach Mike McHugh after the meet. "We knew she had the potential."

And give credit to McHugh, as well. Coaches (in all sports, really) receive both too much credit and too much blame for their team's performances. But McHugh made a crucial line-up switch before sectionals that paid off for the Clippers. He took junior Michaela Rabas out of the 200 IM for sectional -- where McHugh figured she would've qualified for state -- and put her on three relays, including the meet-ending 400 free relay. McHugh said the move cost the team points at sectionals, where the team finished third at Plymouth behind Whitefish Bay and Shorewood, but assured the Clippers would have three relays competing at what was expected to be -- and turned out to be -- a very close meet.

"Without Michaela on that relay, we probably don't win state," he said. "We gave up a sectional title to try to win state."

McHugh's decision to load up the freestyle sprints also paid off in a big way. He loaded up the 50 and 100 frees at sectionals with eight entries, and got six through to state (3 each in the 50 and 100). Seeded to score 52 points at state, the Clipper sprinters scored 64 -- a big portion of their margin over DeForest. Before the season began, McHugh took a close look at last year's D2 state meet, reviewed who was graduating and returning in various events, assessed his team's strengths, and figured freestyle sprints were the way to go.

"It was just a logical move," he said.

So congratulations to Sturgeon Bay/Sevastopol, and look out next year as well -- the team returns a good share of the swimmers who led the team to the title.

As for DeForest and Whitefish Bay, the teams swam nearly exactly as seeded -- 186 points for DeForest (seeded at 182), and 179.9.5 for Whitefish Bay (seeded at 178). DeForest coach Sue Winckler said she was happy with how her team swam.

"Our girls swam well; we moved up in points," she said. "But Sturgeon Bay moved up a little more. We had a lot of fast swims."

Other meet highlights:

-- Performance of the night: A tie between Brookfield Academy junior Kelsey Hojan-Clark's 500 free win and Sturgeon Bay/Sevastopol's 200 free relay. Is there a better swimmer in D2 than Hojan-Clark? Maybe a better question -- is there a better swimmer in the entire state? After first setting a state record in the 200 free by 8/10's of a second with a time of 1:49.13, Hojan-Clark obliterated the 500 record with a time of 4:50.19, nearly four seconds under the previous state record (both of them dating to 1996 and held by Shorewood's Jamie Belfor, generally recognized as one the best D2 swimmers in state history). Her 14+ second victory was hardly boring; with each lap, Hojan-Clark extended her lead to a rising chorus of cheers from an appreciative audience at the Nat. It was a stunning swim; only Madison East star Aja Van Hout, two-time winner of the D1 500 free, has ever swum a faster 500 free in state history. And Hojan-Clark swam the race alone for the last 400 yards against some high-caliber swimmers, including runner-up Casey Wolters of DeForest and Shorewood's Clare Chamberlain.

As for the Clippers' 200 free relay, here's the thing -- its record time of 1:36.02 actually could've been faster. With leadoff swimmer Sierra Townsend giving the team a lead with a 24.15 start -- and the team desperately needing the 40 team points it would get from winning the relay -- relay swimmers Rabas, McKenzie Trelka, and Savanna Townsend took fairly conservative relay starts, making sure not to DQ (in a meet that did see two relay DQs). The Clippers' relay was already more than half-a-second under the existing state record coming into the meet with a seed time of 1:38.43; McHugh predicted before the meet they could maybe get that down to 1:37.50. McHugh had to do a double-take when he looked at the scoreboard following the relay win. "I was just absolutely floored."

-- Race of the night: In a meet with a lot of close races, the best came early, when Milton senior Jennah Haney edged out Shorewood's Chamberlain in the 200 IM. Haney came in with the top seed, but Chamberlain was the two-time defending state champ in the event. The two pulled away from the field quickly, and when Chamberlain turned for the third leg of the event, the breaststroke, she was ahead by nearly a second. But Haney, one of D2's best breaststrokers, ripped off a 35.82 leg on the breaststroke, making up ground on Chamberlain, a very good breaststroker herself. When the two turned for the final 50-yard free sprint, Chamberlain held the slightest of edges, and still had the lead coming off the final turn. But Haney nudged ahead with 15 yards to go, and held off Chamberlain 2:04.83 to 2:04.98. Here's a video of Haney talking about her win:
http://host.madison.com/html_6f7b6cc8-d0d4-11de-9bd3-001cc4c002e0.html

-- Swimmer of the night: It has to go to Hojan-Clark with her two record-setting wins, but Sauk Prairie junior Alison Meng deserves mention for her two wins in the 100 fly and 100 backstroke. In the fly, she bested a field that saw four swimmers go under 58 seconds and nine under 1 minute. In the back, she won a tightly contested race that included defending state champ Siri Smits. Meng also helped Sauk to a 2nd-place finish in the medley relay and a 4th in the 400 free relay.

-- Good egg award: Whitefish Bay senior Maggie Smith might've been justified in feeling some disappointment on the night; after all, she swam a career-best 23.89 in the 50 free only to finish runner-up in the event for the third year in a row. But Smith's three anchor relay legs produced two gold medals in the medley and 400 free relays, and a podium finish (6th) in the 200 free relay. Her terrific 51.18 anchor leg on the 400 free relay brought her team back from third place in the relay to a second relay win on the night. It left Smith departing the Natatorium for the last time in her high school career, arm in arm with her relay teammates, singing songs as they headed for the locker room. That's a champion in anyone's book.