Girls Swimming Sets 4 School Records at Meet of Champions

SUMMIT— The Hilltoppers girls swim team set four records for Summit High School at the Meet of Champions, finishing out the most successful season since 2003 and one of the most competitive since 1978.  As a team, Summit went all the way to the state semi-finals before losing to Scotch Plains.

"It's really exciting because we know those records are going to be there for a really long time," said senior co-captain K.J. Winchell.  "So we sort of left our mark on the team."

Senior co-captains Carey Fries and Winchell will each leave Summit High School with their name in the books.  Fries, who will be attending the Naval Academy where she will swim for Navy, graduates with the school records in the 200 free, the 500 free, and shares the 200 medley relay and 400 free relay records.  Winchell, who will most likely continue developing her swimming at Peddie in a post-grad year, was a member of both the 200 medley relay and the 400 free relay with Fries.

"Carey and K.J. are swimmers that come along once in a coaching career," said head coach John Ross.

Fries broke the school record in the 200 free and the 500 free, both of which she already held.  Fries' time in the 200 was 1:54.99 which put her in sixth place in the state.  Her time of 5:09.88 in the 500 put her in eighth place in the state and broke her previous school record for the third time.

Winchell joined up with Fries, sophomore Jayne Mandel, and freshmen Tasha Kewalramani and Jackie Joffe.  Joffe was the third member of each relay team at the Meet of Champions.  Kewalramani swam the breaststroke in the 200 medley relay, and Mandel joined in the 400 free relay.

"I felt like I was going to do okay," Mandel said, "but having the good teammates that I had was really the stepping stone that pushed me to do better than what I expected."

The 200 medley of Fries, Winchell, Joffe, and Kewalramani also took home an eighth place finish.  Their time of 1:52.79 broke their own previous school record which they set on the second time they swam as a team in a dual meet against Chatham. 

"The first time that our medley relay swam together at a high school meet we actually made the MOC cut but we missed the record by a little bit," Kewalramani said.  "The next time we swam we broke the record."

It was another eighth place finish, the 400 free relay, that turned heads though.  The girls shaved 8 seconds off of their personal best to shatter a record that had been standing since 1978.  The girls swam the relay in 3:42.74, which bettered the previous record by nearly six seconds.

"With the 400 freestyle relay," Fries said, "I swam the last leg, so touching the wall and then looking up at the time and seeing that we dropped six seconds was pretty amazing.  And I'm pretty sure a lot of people heard me scream a little."

For head coach John Ross, the departure of Fries and Winchell marks the end of an era.

"I started as a freshman coach when they were freshman swimmers," Ross said.  "So we've sort of grown together.  I've never coached a team without them on it."

Fries and Winchell have handed the title of "co-captains" to juniors Kelly Houck and Caroline Delaney.

"Where Carey and K.J. brought a lot of intensity, and were obviously my top two swimmers, Caroline and Kelly are more team builders, so I think a lot of girls are going to be able to relate to them," Ross said. "I don't know if it's going to be quite the intense competitive team that we were, but we're not going to fall off a ledge."

Luckily for Ross, there are still three girls on the team who have been to the Meet of Champions and who intend on bringing the team back there next year. 

"I want us to make to MOCs again," Joffe said. "I really want to get another strong relay together.  I want to work on personalized strokes because I really want to go with another relay."