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Coach Crawford's Lineup Brings a Two Point Victory Over the Bengals

Coach Kevin Setterholm

The Centennial boys swimming team battled the Blaine Bengals for the seventh-place ranking in the twelve team Northwest Suburban Conference on February 2.  A few days before the event, Head Coach Pete Crawford knew that it was going to be an extremely close meet because on paper the two teams matched up evenly.  By studying past Bengal race results and playing around with Centennial’s line-up, Coach Pete believed that the Cougars would be able to pull off a win if the Centennial swimmers approached their races with a focused mind and 100% effort.

Blaine came to the meet with more power than Centennial and captured most of the first-place finishes, but Centennial’s depth often responded to a Bengal first with a second, third and fourth place finish combination allowing the Cougars to outscore Blaine in many of the events.  As predicted, the victor of the meet was not determined until the completion of the last event when the Cougar's second place finish in the 400 freestyle relay finalized the score at Centennial 94 and Blaine 92.

Taking first for Centennial were George Atkinson, Max Scheurer, Alex Larkin, Connor Herbrechtsmeyer in the 200 Medley Relay; Max Scheurer in the 200 IM and the 100 Breaststroke; and Connor Herbrechtsmeyer in the 50 freestyle.

After the meet, Coach Pete was not only excited about the win, but also by how the team, as a whole, stepped-up to make the win happen. He pointed out, during the bus ride home, that the Cougars turned out many fabulous performances that were needed to make the win happen. Assistant coach Kevin Setterholm stated that "the boys were hungry for a win, and they swam out of their comfort zones (through pain) to get it. After a week of grueling practices meant to prepare the swimmers for the end of the season tournaments, Centennial swimmers still came out of this meet with 68 best performances. These "season best" performances are what allowed the team to beat Blaine."

With the conclusion of the dual meet season, the Centennial swimming team will now be focused on preparing for the Junior Varsity Championship meet that will take place on February 12, and the Section 7AA Championship meet that will take place on February 24-26.