EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP – The Mainland Regional High School girls swim team led their Egg Harbor Township counterparts by as many as 22 points in the Dec. 16 meet, but the Eagles closed the gap to just 8 points with one event to go.
If EHT could dominate the 400-meter freestyle relay, the Eagles had a chance to top their Mustang counterparts, but Mainland proved too strong, taking the final race and the meet with a 92-78 final score.
It was the third straight win for the Mustangs, who opened the season with a 127-43 win over Kingsway and followed that with a 69-25 victory over Millville. It was EHT’s first loss of the season; the Eagles opened with a 132-33 win over Absegami.
“I’m happy with how things are going,” Mainland coach Mike Schiavo said. “It’s a new team, new year, new personalities, new strengths, new weaknesses that we’re trying to figure out right now.”
The team was unbeaten last year, but it was an abbreviated season because of COVID-19 limits on high school sports. Now he is getting athletes used to the rigors of high school swimming again.
The team is “adjusting nicely to graduation from last year to getting back to a regular season, juggling high school and club demands, juggling health and safety protocols, trying to be as safe and smart as we can while trying to have as much fun as we can,” Schiavo said.
“Last year we were just happy to get a season in,” he added.
“We had an abbreviated season last year and I just look at it as one group – and that’s the seniors – who really remember what it was like to have real season.” That means he’s working to get his juniors, sophomores and freshmen “used to high school swimming and the demands that come with it and the joys that come with it.” Even though the juniors are in their third year, he said freshmen year is “just a blur no matter what sport” and their sophomore year was the pandemic year.
That’s why he’s taking everything “one day at a time” right now.
His senior leaders and captains include Emma Barnhart, Alex Batty, Sophie Sherwood, Cassidy Thomas, Riley Hieb and Kyra White. Add to that some of his juniors, Monica Iordanov, Summer Cassidy, Ella Culmone and Laci Denn, and a few sophomores, Jordyn Ricciotti and Claudia Booth, “who are doing a really nice job.”
Although his team is off to a 3-0 start, his focus is more than a win-loss record.
“I just want to see them come together as a team, enjoy the process with each other, help everybody with the ups and downs with any normal long tough grind of a high school sport,” Schiavo said. “Swimming is a tough sport. If they can find a way to enjoy it, it makes it a little easier, a little more joyful. And that comes from the relationships that hopefully they build each season.
“In some ways they’re starting from scratch,” he said. “Let’s just come together, swim as fast as we can and have as much fun as we can. That’s always the goal.”
Mainland 92
EHT 78
Katie Carlos, Denise Yushan, Kayla Nguyen and Rhylee Cornell won the opening 200 medley relay for EHT with a time of 2:05.92 and teammates Julia Latham, Rachel Yushan, Summer DeWitt and Sam Bork finished third to give the girls a 10-4 margin to start the Dec. 16 meet. Mustangs Summer Cassidy, Jordyn Ricciotti, Ella Culmone and Emma Barnhart finished second.
The next two races, the 200 freestyle and 200 individual medley, were closer, with the Mustangs edging the Eagles in both.
Ricciotti won the freestyle event in a time of 2:12.17 and teammates Shannon Sharkey and Claudia Booth tied for four. EHT’s Latham and Rachel Yushan were second and third.
Laci Denn powered her way to a win in the medley in 2:39.04 and Cassidy was third, but EHT’s Denise Yushan, Dewitt and Meredith Elko were second, third and fifth to keep the lead at 24-22.
A one-two finish in the fourth event, the 50 freestyle spring, by Alivia Wainwright (27.98) and Monica Iordanov, and a fifth place by teammate Barnhart put the Mustangs in the lead for good at 33-29. Nguyen and Bork were third and fourth for EHT.
The Mustang girls outscored the Eagles in the next four events to widen the gap.
Nguyen won the 100 butterfly in 1:07.18 and teammate Jewel Mallari was fifth, but Mustangs Denn, Culmone and Aixell Perez were second, third and fourth for Mainland to give them a 9-7 edge in points.
Wainwright (1:02.33), Iordanov and Booth finished first, second and fourth to dominate the 100 freestyle as EHT’s Cornell and Bork were third and fifth.
Ricciotti won the 400 freestyle in 4:39.97 with Sharkey third. Latham, DeWitt and Jasmine Chen were second, fourth and fifth for EHT.
When the Mustangs took first and third in the 200 freestyle relay, it put Mainland up 73-51.
Iordanov, Barnhart, Dennis and Wainwright won in 1:56.24 and teammates Iva Palakarska, Perez, Culmone and Booth were third. EHT’s Katie Carlos, Nguyen, Cornell and Denise Yushan were second.
The Eagles controlled the next two events to climb back to an 8-point deficit, 82-74.
EHT finished first, third and fifth in the 100 backstroke led by Carlos in 1:07.79, followed by Ally Seiverd and Elko. Mainland’s Summer Cassidy and Samantha Camey were second and fourth.
And then EHT swept the top three places in the 100 breaststroke with Denise Yushan (1:19.10), Cornell and Rachel Yushan for a lopsided 13-3 score in the event.
Mainland’s Sophie Sherwood and Bonnie Ping were fourth and fifth.
EHT needed to win first and second in the final 400 freestyle relay to overtake Mainland, but the Mustangs captured first and third, putting it away.
Denn, Iordanov, Wainright and Ricciotti won in 4:11.21 and teammates Sharkey, Perez, Cassidy and Booth were third for a 10-4 edge in points. Latham, Carlos, Sydney Moore and Rachel Yushan were second.
EHT went to 1-1 after its season-opening win over Absegami.
By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
