Though the team lost to McNeil at their October 10 meet, they outscored  Rouse to win the Leander’s Cup once again.  The women’s team scored 75 points while McNeil received 124 points and Rouse 86 points. The Men’s team accomplished a score of 70 points, McNeil 160 points and Rouse 56 points.

“Beating Rouse was nice, [beating] them again,” senior Samantha Ephlin said. “Even though I think they had about ten more kids than we did, and we still were able to win.”

For the McNeil and Rouse meet, junior Ricardo Vargas won in Boys 100 yard freestyle and sophomore Sarah Cano earned double wins for the Girls 200 yard freestyle and 100 yard freestyle. Both teams had a win for relays.

“We had a good line up against them but it was a close meet again,” Coach Sully said. “I think we only won by maybe 3 points. We also had McNeil there. McNeil is a 6A school and I’ve known their coach for a long time so he likes coming up and racing at our pool.”

The meet against Georgetown and East View ended with similar results. Georgetown slipped by against both the Boys and Girls teams, but they were able to defeat East View.

“We have to continue doing what we’re doing and realize that we’re working hard in the pool and that we’re going to be tired going into these meets,” Sully said. “You can’t get down on yourself if you don’t get a best time at this point in the season.”

The single event first place winners were Cano for the 100 yard backstroke and sophomore Leon Ward for 100 freestyle. Each team won one relay race.

“I’m looking forward to getting to race different teams and watching my team have an awesome season,” Cano said.

With the first phase of the season done, the team is preparing for invitationals in three weeks. There will be 30+ teams at UT for the first round on November 6.

“Seeing how our athletes do on that big stage,” Coach Sully said. “You’re going to have competition on either side of you all the time. Unless you’re winning the event there’s just always going to be obviously, someone faster than you. It’s going to be like a mini-regionals meet just because there’s so many schools there and so many talented kids. I’m just looking to see if we rise to that challenge. It’s always fun to see who doesn’t get overcome by stage fright and really takes advantage of a faster pool and exciting environment.”

Several area teams are invited to swim at bigger pools and meets. Invitationals consists of a preliminary round and a final round. Those who are in the top percent for preliminaries move on to the final round.

“I feel good,” Cano said. “I know that with a lot of these teams coming together that there is going to be some more competition, but I feel confident that this is going to be a good season.”