After two tough days of sections, Park boys swimming placed third overall Feb. 24. Despite receiving no points from diving due to the lack of a team, as well as the issues that come with having a small team, Park placed just 14 points behind second place and is sending one swimmer to State — Henry Berg.
Junior Henry Berg said the nature of sections as a multi-day event comes with some struggles.
“(Sections went) pretty well, I went out strong in prelims and then I managed to stay here in finals,” Berg said. “Two-day meets are tough like this because we’re trying to go as fast as we can for two days instead of just one, and there’s some great competition here.”
Captain Henry Salita said the team was satisfied with the result of the meet, given the tough competition present, as well as other schools having diving which will add to the school’s overall team scores.
“Overall our team is very happy with how most of us swam, especially on day one, we had a really good prelims. The team was happy we got third and we don’t have a diving team, so that was nice to beat other teams with divers,” Salita said. “We did not qualify any of our relays for state this year, which is a little bit of a bummer, but we still have an individual qualifier so we have some Park representation with Henry Berg at the state meet next weekend.”
Head coach Amanda Forsberg said there are difficulties the team has gone through, but they have persevered and made it work.
“We had a phenomenal season considering how small of a team we are and considering that we have no diving, so every meet we’re kind of behind,” Forsberg said. “Everyone’s at their fastest and everyone drops a bunch of time. They put in the work and it showed today.”
According to Berg, the team undergoes a taper leading up to sections and state, where swimmers decrease their exercise and increase their rest.
“(Preparation) has been the whole entire year. But the last couple of weeks we’ve been tapering down and working hard every single day,” Berg said.
Salita said he’s seen the team transform over time, but a consistent issue has been the lack of depth and numbers. Beyond this, Salita said the team is still capable of doing great things.
“I’ve seen a whole lot of different versions of the Park swim team and I think one of our biggest challenges is we never really have a large number of kids, so we always struggle with depth,” Salita said. “But every single year I’ve been on the team we’ve still managed to do impressive things like win our conference, or this year get second or third at sections. All those things show how kids on the Park team can step up, even facing these issues.”
According to Forsberg, she sends warm regards for the parting seniors, and said they are a big part of the team and will be missed.
“I’m already excited for next year, and I’m sad for our two seniors who had great leadership this year. There will be a big hole next year without them,” Forsberg said. “I’m really proud of my seniors, they went out with phenomenal swims and they will be very missed next year.”
State prelims will take place March 1 at the Jean K. Freeman Aquatic Center at the University of Minnesota and finals will be March 2. Burg is swimming the 500 free.
