Santa Monica rare new women's state swim champ, Sierra collects third straight men's title
Sierra Men's Champion squad above
Complete Overall 40-Event Results
MONTEREY PARK - For the first 43 state meets, just six colleges experienced what its like to win a women's team title. Santa Monica College became the seventh on Saturday as the Corsairs captured the 3C2A Swimming and Diving championship.
Also at East LA College's Swim Stadium, Sierra College collected its third consecutive men's 3C2A state title with a giant 210-point margin of victory over second-place Orange Coast. Mt. San Antonio placed third.
The Corsairs were paced by sweeping all five of the relays in a true team triumph. SMC's roster of talented swimmers began with last year's Swimmer of the Meet Risa Akatsu but bolstered by Wilma Henriksson, Ema Kilmauskas, Emily Lester, Reva Reignier, and Valerie Burchard. Santa Monica is also the first Western State Conference college to win a women's swim title.
"When Emily had a good exchange in the final relay, then I could breathe because Sierra pushed us throughout the meet," said SMC head coach Brian Eskridge. " I wasn't sure what we had coming into the year, but then we picked up Wilma and things fell into place. These swimmers pushed each other every practice led by Risa, our leader. I never thought before the season that we were going to win a state title. I'm so proud of what this group accomplished."
Santa Monica won by 38 points over second-place Sierra with Orange Coast placing third.
On the men's side, Sierra's title was about depth according to head coach Chris Breitbart. "This was a complete team, one that had a goal to win the state title. Mission accomplished" he said.
"Jake Reuter is one of the greatest athletes to come through our program and for him to achieve a state meet record (400 IM) is something others will now have to chase. With Andrew Espinosa and Evan Terry, we had three leaders that were a huge part of two championship teams. Orange Coast has always been a formidable foe and they were setting meet records, but we had the depth. We felt we didn't have to win races, but do our job to gather points throughout."
Terry won the 100 backstroke gold, the team won the 200 and 800 freestyle relays while Reuter won two events.
Orange Coast won an impressive men's meet-high seven golds, three set by Ethan Smith. The split between North and South swimmers with event wins was exactly in half--10 and 10. SMC's five golds led the women's pack.
Appropriately, a run of state meets at ELAC ended how it started back in 2009 with five state meet records on the final day and 10 overall for the '23 meet. Overall, the ELAC pool produced an amazing 62 state meet records. With new swim facilities at a number of colleges, it's possible this may be the last one hosted at the South Coast Conference college.
2023 Meet Awards
Men's Swimmer of the Meet: Ethan Smith, Orange Coast, 50 freestyle, 100 butterfly, 200 butterfly titles (6-time state champion, 2-time Swimmer of Year)
Women's Co-Swimmers of the Meet: Mia Park, El Camino, 100, 200, 500 freestyle titles; Courtney Seljeseth, De Anza, 200 IM, 100/200 breaststroke titles
Men's Performance of the Meet: Jake Reuter, 400 IM (state meet record)
Women's Performance of the Meet: Isabella Urlando, Santa Barbara, 200 backstroke (state meet record)
Men's Swim Coach of the Year: Chris Breitbart, Sierra
Women's Swim Coach of the Year: Brian Eskridge, Santa Monica
Men's Diver of the Year: Donovan Taylor, Palomar, 1-meter, 3-meter board champion
Women's Diver of the Year: Maia Chase, Santa Rosa, 1-meter board champion
Men's Diving Coach of Year: Marnie Young, Palomar
Women's Diving Coach of Year: Eddie Stevens, Santa Rosa
WOMEN'S FINAL TOP 10 STANDINGS: 1. Santa Monica 410, 2. Sierra 372, 3. Orange Coast 333, 4. Santa Rosa JC 304, 5. Santa Barbara CC 304, 5. Santa Rosa JC, 6. Palomar 201, 7. Diablo Valley 193, 9. Riverside CC 173.5, 10. American River, 150.
MEN'S FINAL TOP 10 STANDINGS: 1. Sierra 712 2. Orange Coast 502, 3. Mt. San Antonio 316.5, 4. Las Positas 281.5, 5. Palomar 237, 6. Golden West 232, 7. Cuesta 207, 8. College of the Sequoias 188, 9. West Valley 185, 10. Riverside 155.
Saturday, May 6
Event #29: W-1,650 freestyle: Champion--Giselle Quinonez, Orange Coast, 17:45.01, 2. Emma Marsalek, Allan Hancock, 18:12.02, 3. Kennedy Brubaker, San Joaquin Delta, 18:23.31. Quinonez not only repeated as the mile swim champ she did so by slicing 20 seconds off her freshman time. The Pirate overtook early leader Marsalek by the 500-yard mark and distanced herself from the field the rest of the way.
Event #30: M-1,650 freestyle: Champion--Marco Holunga, Las Positas, 15:53.52, 2. Samuel Slezak, Mt. San Antonio, 15:54.05, 3. Brandon Samaniego, Orange Coast, 16:03.22. Once again, regular seed times didn't apply in the men's mile as Holunga led from wire to wire, but fought off a late challenge by Slezak. Despite being as far back as 10 seconds, Slezak made up a lot of the difference over the final 500 yards including a phenomenal final 100 of 54.43. Holunga was double title winner with his early 500 freestyle gold.
Event #31: W-200 backstroke: STATE MEET RECORD-Champion--Isabella Urlando, Santa Barbara, 2:01.56, 2. Olivia Khan, Foothill, 2:06.15, 3. Ruby Gonzalez, Santa Rosa, 2:08.30. Urlando saved up for the final by taking off 4.27 seconds from her prelims warmup for the meet's sixth new state standard. She broke the record of San Mateo's Erica Vong by .19. A fast 29.26 opening 50 split got things going for the speedy Vaquero.
Event #32: M-200 backstroke: Champion--Tatsuki Inoue, Orange Coast, 1:45.99, 2. Matthew Simpson, Orange Coast, 1:48.12, 3. Evan Terry, Sierra, 1:48.14. Call it deja vu or consistency, but the the top three swimmers made it easy for the release author by duplicating the exact 1-2-3 order of finish as last year. Inoue dropped his '22 first-place winning time by 1.62 seconds. Simpson sliced his by 1.05 and Terry by 1.41.
Event #33: W-100 freestyle: Champion--Mia Park, El Camino, 52.11, Camryn Bussey, Sierra, 52.28, 3. Alessandra Fleischman, Palomar, 52.42. Like last year, defending champ Bussey bolted to the lead after 50 at 24.98, but as expected this year, the field pressured her late. Bussey, Park, and Fleischman battled over the last 10 yards with Park just edging out Bussey by .17 for the El Camino swimmer's third gold. Park swam an exceptional 26.83 final 50 for the difference.
Event #34: M-100 freestyle: Champion--Joshy Peters, Sequoias, 44.33, 2. Sullivan Moore, Long Beach, 45.39, 3. Andrew Espinosa, Sierra, 45.42. Peters shaved 1.11 seconds off his third-place time as a freshman to overtake defending champ Espinosa and second-place Moore for the gold here. Moore led after 50 at 21.49, but Peters exploded down the stretch and hit 22.77 over the last 50 for the title.
Event #35: W-200 breaststroke: Champion--Courtney Seljeseth, De Anza, 2:19.70, 2. Maya Garcia-Hale, Grossmont, 2:23.79, 3. Wilma Henriksson, Santa Monica, 2:24.24. Seljeseth became a double champion with her dominating performance in the longer breaststroke. She opened with a 30.73, but it was her middle splits that allowed her to breeze to a more than 4-second victory. One of the greatest swimmers in Coast Conference history, she won all three of her individual events.
Event #36: M-200 breaststroke: Champion--Jake Reuter, Sierra, 2:00.53, 2. Deklan Heinzen, Sierra, 2:03.19, 3. Srboljub Filipovic, Golden West, 2:03.41. "Roto Reuter that's the name and away go Sierra's troubles down the drain." That's what Reuter meant to the Wolverines as the uber talent collected his fifth state gold in two years and helped his team immensely in winning two state team championships.
Event #37: W-200 butterfly: Champion--STATE MEET RECORD-Champion-Emma Hart, Palomar, 2:03.76, 2. Ema Kilmauskas, Santa Monica, 2:07.16, 3. Stanislava Holzhauser, Santa Rosa, 2:11.37. In informing the public address announcer her walk-up song, Hart pulled a Babe Ruth with her "called shot," predicting she would break the state record in this event. And that's exactly what she did in posting a third state record in two days as the Queen of the Fly. Hart did it the hard way as she needed every bit of her final 32.24 split to beat Diablo Valley's Kelsey Leonard's 2015 record by just .02. Hart broke 2 state meet records and did not receive an award, which tells you how impressive the group of swimmers were on the women's side this year.
Event #38: M-200 butterfly: Champion--STATE MEET RECORD-Champion-Ethan Smith, Orange Coast, 1:44.45, 2. Tommy Collins, Sierra, 1:48.04, 3. Caleb Tracy, Sierra, 1:51.62. Falling a bit short last year, Smith was determined to break the state record and he obliterated a 17-year-old standard by 1.19. Smith opened with a blistering 23.03 and closed like a man on a mission with a 28.25. Sierra's Collins and Tracy took silver and bronze--the second year in a row for Tracy.
Event #39: W-400 freestyle relay: Champion--Santa Monica 3:33.67 (Risa Akatsu, Reva Reignier, Ema Kilmauskas, Emily Lester) 2. Santa Barbara 3:37.99, 3. Orange Coast 3:41.99. A remarkable five relay titles were achieved by the team champion Corsairs capped with another strong win by 4-plus seconds to close out the meet. Once again fellow Western State Conference foe SBCC grabbed second. Lester was a worthy closer here with a 52.64 split.
Event #40: M-400 freestyle relay: Champion--STATE MEET RECORD-Champion-Orange Coast, 2:59.94 (Ethan Smith, Dane Howell, Matthew Simpson, Mason Parker), 2. Sierra 3:00.52, 3. West Valley 3:06.05. An amazing run of relay swims by the Pirates was capped by what else but another state record as this four-man unit became the first-ever to break three minutes. STATE MEET RECORD-100 freestyle-Ethan Smith, 43.58. Smith's opening 100 split snapped the state record of 43.83 set by San Diego Mesa's Brandon Crabtree in 2018.
Release by Robert Lewis, for the 3C2A-state meet SID