This year, swim and dive is expected to have a very successful season. With the help of the head coach, Mrs. Crawford, each swimmer and diver is well prepared for the season to come. Swim and dive is a very demanding sport that girls have to work on day and night in order to be prepared. With freshman swimmers signing up, they have a brand new team to show the world what they have to offer.

Team captains this upcoming season include Rylee Deckard, Grace Howery and Hannah Reeb. Each senior is working hard to improve the team as much as possible, as well as helping out unexperienced freshman swimmers and leading them to great success this year. The other higher classmen swim and divers are entering this season with skills they’ve learned from previous years.

 “I like that you get out of it what you put into it. Your time [for each lap] isn’t going to change unless you work hard at practice,” team co-captain Hannah Reeb said.

One of the common misconceptions about swim and dive is that it is not a team sport, but that could not be farther from the truth. 

“A lot of people think of swimming as an individual sport, and there’s a lot of teamwork that goes into it,” Coach Crawford said. “We have relay events, and when one event doesn’t go well, it does affect how the team scores.” Every girl holds their team up to work harder and get even stronger.  

There is actually a lot to swimming besides just getting the best time or have the fanciest dive. Swimmers can participate in many different events, such as individual events and relay races. These events can include different swimming strokes, such as the butterfly or freestyle. Swimmers are graded on not just their time, but their form as well; a simple mistake such as not touching both hands during a butterfly stroke could mean a disqualification. 

An important aspect of swim and dive is the competition. Each girl must be extremely competitive in order to get a good score. They also need to be able to push themselves and stay in control when they are at their limits. If they are not able to do that, then there will not be any results. 

One of the struggles that the team has is that the high school does not have a swimming pool, contrary to the rumor spreading that there is one hidden somewhere in the school. The team practices at the O’Fallon YMCA, meaning they must travel 20 minutes away. Because of early morning practices for the swim team and the drive to the YMCA, the swimmers have to get up earlier than five o’clock to practice. With the new Rec-Plex that is being built on the parkway, the team will be able to get up a much later than four o’clock.

This year, the girls swim and dive team is expected to have a great start. With a notable track record, the swim team is going to have to put everything they have into this year. In the past years, our team took 3rd in the FZN Invitational and 4th at the GACs. One of our finest divers, Gracyn Petrusinski, competed in the State Diving Competition, leaving hope that she will return as a senior to compete at state once more. Anything is possible this season, and only time will tell how this year will fare for the swim team.