Boys Win MJB Meet of Champions! Girls Take Third
On Friday and Saturday, December 20-21, the Bears traveled to Marist to compete in the annual Madeleine Jude Brown Meet of Champions. The meet is a memorial to a loved swimmer that competed for Marist and then tragically drown while competing for Emory. For the first time in program history, the boys' team took home the overall win, with 17 schools in the competition! The girls' team took third, but the Bears took second overall for combined team score. The Bears had an outstanding two days of competition!
Diving - Friday
On Friday evening, the diving Bears participated in their event.
For the boys, Josh Oblen was the only boy to represent the Bears. Oblen had an excellent performance and showed tons of improvement! He scored 155.70 overall, which earned him ninth place!
The girls had an OUTSTANDING performance! Brooklyn Petit took the championship title with a score of 326.15! Two of Brooklyn's dives earned individual scores of 10s and 9s from the judges! Lilah Versluis had her best performance of the season with her second place win with a score of 231.10! Taylor Eastman had a lot of excellent dives and also continues to grow and develop as a diver! With her best performance of the season, Eastman took 16th!
Swimming - Saturday
Starting off in the medley relay, the boys A-team (John Murphy, Yan Berezitsky, Elijah Edison, Bryson Mynatt) took seventh overall. The B-relay (Pranav Kolathaya, Avi Saxena, Tom Berezitsky, Caden Whalen) took 20th overall.
For the girls, the A-relay (Ana-Clare Grann, Veronika Kolesnikov, Leila Kader, Audrey Lampa) took 11th overall and the B-relay (Bella Phillips, Sydney Edison, Christine McVicker, Sela Guy) took 24th.
In the boys 200-freestyle, Gavin Schoeling went a new individual state qualifying best time of 1:46.73 and won the event! Teammate Tayne Naude was close behind in fourth with a state qualifying time of 1:51.73! John Murphy took 11th, Elijah Edison went a new best time to take 16th, and Caden Whalen took 24th.
In the girls event, Leila Kader swam a new best time and took 11th!
In the boys 200-individual medley, Oscar Ryzhkov swam a new best time of 2:05.34 and took second place overall! Yan Berezitsky was close behind in fifth with a new best time!
In the girls event, the girls swept the top spots! Jennifer Griner took first and Amber Naude took second! Both swam state qualifying times. Molly Melchiors took 10th, Audrey Lampa took 13th with a new best time, and Sydney Edison took 14th!
In the boys 50-freestyle, Jax Jackson took eighth with a new best time of 22.89 and teammate Bryson Mynatt finished immediately after in ninth with his first individual state qualifying swim with a time of 23.33! Tate Robertson took 30th, Pranav Kolathaya took 45th with a new best time, Tom Berezitsky took 48th, Avi Saxena took 77th with a new best time.
For the girls, Ana-Clare Grann took 26th Veronika Kolesnikov took 53rd, Ella Fajen took 91st with a new best time, Sela Guy took 92nd with a new best time, and Bella Phillips took 126th.
In the boys 100-butterfly, Gavin Schoeling took another gold with a new best time of 52.64, just off the school record! Oscar Ryzhkov took third, both with state qualifying times. John Murphy swam a new best time to take seventh, Bryson Mynatt took ninth with a new best time, and Caden Whalen took 23rd.
In the girls event, Caroline Gaines took sixth, followed by Christine McVicker in 13th with a new best time.
In the boys 100-freestyle, James Kates took 27th, Pranav Kolathaya took 29th, Avi Saxena took 50th with a new best time, and Campen Dawes took 53rd.
In the girls 100-freestyle, Jennifer Griner took third and Caroline Garijo took 10th with a new best time, both with state qualifying times! This was the first state qualifying event for Garijo. Alexis Walkenhorst took 27th, Veronika Kolesnikov took 43rd, Sela Guy took 72nd with a new best time, Ella Fajen took 79th and Bella Phillips took 96th with a new best time.
In the boys 500-freestyle, Jax Jackson won the event with a time of 4:53.49. Tayne Naude swam his final individual state qualifying event by taking second, to officially earn his Iron Bear title. Elijah Edison took fifth with a HUGE time drop of over 20-seconds!
In the girls event, Amber Naude clocked her final individual state qualifying time and took seventh overall. She officially earned her Iron Bear title with this event!
The boys 200-freestyle relay (Tayne Naude, Jax Jackson, Oscar Ryzhkov, Gavin Schoeling) won the event with a new best time of 1:30.00. The team is .07-seconds away from a new school record! The B-relay (Bryson Mynatt, Tate Robertson, Elijah Edison, Pranav Kolathaya) took eighth. The C-relay (Campen Dawes, Caden Whalen, James Kates, Avi Saxena) took 22nd.
The girls followed the boys and won the 200-free relay as well! The relay (Amber Naude, Caroline Gaines, Carolino Garijo, Jennifer Griner) finished with a time of 1:41.44, a new season best state qualifying time and only a second away from a new school record! The B-relay (Ana-Clare Grann, Molly Melchiors, Audrey Lampa, Alexis Walkenhorst) took 10th and the C-relay (Christine McVicker, Ella Fajen, Sela Guy, Bella Phillips) took 22nd.
In the boys 100-backstroke, Yan Berezitsky took 14th, James Kates took 17th with a new best time, and Campen Dawes took 19th with a new best time.
For the girls, Caroline Gaines sneaked up on the competition in the final 25-yards and won the event with a state qualifying time of 1:01.45, a new season best time! Audrey Lampa swam a new best time and took 7th, and Ana-Clare Grann took eighth.
In the boys 100-breaststroke, Tom Berezitsky swam a new best time and took 14th, and Tate Robertson swam a new best time and took 18th place.
For the girls, Molly Melchiors clocked another state qualifying event with a time of 1:14.72, earning her seventh place overall! Caroline Garijo took 10th with a new best time, Sydney Edison took 14th with a new best time, Leila Kader took 15th, and Christine McVicker took 27th.
In the final event of the day, the boys 400-freestyle relay won another event with a new school record time of 3:16.68! The A-relay (Tayne Naude, Jax Jackson, Oscar Ryzhkov, Gavin Schoeling) took down a record that has been there since 2015! The boys team has only one school record left to replace, and they plan to do that next week at Fulton County Championships.
The girls team followed the boys' energy and also claimed the win! WIth a new season best state qualifying time of 3:42.94, the A-team (Amber Naude, Caroline Garijo, Caroline Gaines, Jennifer Griner) continue to sharpen their relay and are getting themselves ready for championship season next month! The B-relay (Molly Melchiors, Leila Kader, Alexis Walkenhorst, Audrey Lampa) took sixth.
With only two meets left in the regular season (divers have three), the Bears would love to see you come and cheer them on! The Bears will be competing in the Cambridge Dive Invitational (diving only) on December 27th at 3 PM, then Fulton County Championships on January 9th, and then Metro Championships on January 24th and 25th. State championships is shaping up to be very exciting for the Bears, we hope you'll join us at Georgia Tech!