Girls' Swim/Dive: Season Preview
By: Maddie Greer
Capitalizing on Last Year's Success
Girls' swimming is ready to build on the success from last year. Last season, the team finished 3rd in HCC Championships and won Sectionals for the 6th year in a row. Senior diver Hannah Truax made it to State, finishing 8th in Prelims, 12th in Semi-Finals and 13th in Finals. Truax also just signed with University of Utah for diving. The relay team of senior Elise Dahlke, junior Maria Gutzweiler, senior Julia Stonebraker and sophomore Margie Miller also made it to state in the 200 Freestyle relay and set a school record in the process.
Key Players and Pre-season Assessment
All 5 of the state qualifying swimmers will be back this season, setting up a promising pre-season overview. The team is led by 10 seniors, including Stonebraker, Dahlke and Truax. Head Coach Keith Gast says the team's strengths heading into the season are largely based on the performances of last year; "On the girl's team, diving is a strength for us. Hannah coming back, senior Maya Leman and junior Emma Wolf could all end up at the state meet and scoring this season. Our girl's sprint team with the 200 free relay is our biggest swimming strength." Last year, the Dogs had a 5-6 record with wins over Westfield, Pike, Terre Haute North Vigo, Ben Davis and Crawfordsville. The Bulldogs had impressive best team times for events as well. Senior Truax led diving with 366 points, sophomore Margie Miller in the 50 Free with a time of 0:25.5, senior Elise Dahlke in the 100 Free with a time of 00:55.65 and 200 Free with a time of 01:59.96, sophomore Erin Haycox in the 100 Fly with a time of 01:03.48 and sophomore Annika Schaekel in the 100 Breast with a time of 01:13.58. Relay times were 01:42.5 for the 200 Free Relay, 01:52.72 for the 200 Medley Relay and 03:43.05 for the 400 Free Relay.
What's Coming Up for the Bulldogs
The Dogs are looking forward to a new season of possibilities. They will face 5 HCC schools right off the bat at the beginning of the season, including Fishers/Westfield, Zionsville, HSE and Avon. Definite dates to put on the calendar now are Dec. 10 (Avon), Dec. 14 (Bulldog Relays) and Jan. 11 (HCC Invite). Head Coach Gast says they have "a really deep team and believe we can continue on last year's success" and "we are looking forward to swimming Avon at home in December, HCC in January we'd like to prove that last year's success wasn't a fluke, we'd like to keep or improve on the third place finishes."
The Dogs will kick off the season at Terre Haute North Vigo on Nov. 26 at 6:30 pm.
Follow @bhsdogs on Twitter and stay posted to brownsburgathletics.com all season long for updates and information on Brownsburg girls' swimming.
