Girls Swimming: Oswego East Nelly Casas wins twice

Updated: November 12, 2011 8:29PM

The Naperville area traditionally hosts the toughest girls swimming sectional in the state, consistently producing the most state qualifiers and featuring many of the brightest stars.

On occasion, new stars are born, as was the case Saturday at Neuqua Valley.

Oswego East sophomore Nelly Casas enjoyed a breakout performance and was the only swimmer to win two individual races. Casas, who didn’t qualify for state as a freshman, captured the 200-yard freestyle in 1:53.65 and the 500 free in 5:02.92.

“I was hoping to do really good,” Casas said. “I wasn’t expecting to do this good but I’m just so happy to make state. It just felt so good to know that I achieved at this [level].”

Casas easily established new personal best times in both events, dropping 11 seconds off her seed time in the 500 and six seconds in the 200. That may have shocked many fans, but not Oswego East coach Deryl Leubner.

“She’s been getting faster and faster every week all season long, so I really expected her to have a great swim,” Leubner said. “Once she swam her 200, I knew how she would swim her 500 and if she stayed with everybody the first half that she’d be able to [win].”

There was no magic formula behind Casas’ fast rise.

“It was just me wanting to make state this year, just knowing that all the hard work and sacrifice has paid off,” she said. “I want to drop more time and I’m really excited.”

Casas was one of four girls to win their first sectional titles. Naperville Central senior Emily Sejna captured the 100 free in 52.69 and anchored teammates Maria Villa, Erin Stevens and Lauren Gunn to victory in the 200 free relay in 1:37.05.

“I’m ecstatic. Personally it surprised me but going into it we’ve been training hard, the whole team,” said Sejna, who will play water polo at Michigan. “It’s just awesome to see that everyone is doing so well, including myself. The whole team atmosphere has been awesome the whole season.”

The other first-time champions were Metea Valley senior Megan Sellers in the 100 breaststroke, West Chicago junior Maya Skorupski in the 100 backstroke and Waubonsie Valley sophomore Madeline Hunt in the 50 free.

Sellers, a three-time state medalist, won the breaststroke in 1:04.68, just .05 off her personal best and the second-fastest time in the state this year.

“It was so close, so I can’t complain about that,” said Sellers, an East Carolina recruit. “My ultimate goal is to go my personal best and I haven’t broken my time in three years, so it gives me a lot of confidence knowing that I can go so close to it untapered.”

All told, 60 individual swims and 16 relays advanced to next weekend’s state finals at New Trier. Rosary won the team title with 253 points, while Neuqua Valley was second with 215 and Naperville Central third with 204.

Rosary and Neuqua Valley figure to be in the trophy hunt next week along with defending champion and favorite New Trier, Loyola and Fenwick.

“We scored 120 points last year [at state] with a disqualification in a relay and we only have one girl that didn’t come back from that group, so we’ve always felt that we were going to be a serious trophy contender,” said Rosary coach Bill Schalz, whose team qualified 13 individuals and all three relays. “If we have a great meet then hopefully we’ll be able to press New Trier. New Trier is the best team in the state. If they have a few hiccups, you never know.”

Senior Sarah Sykstus led the way for the Beads by winning the 200 individual medley (2:08.44) and helping the 200 medley and 200 free relays to second place. Rosary finished the meet by taking the 400 free relay in 3:34.94 behind Rachel Burke, Emily Launer, Erin Hart and Molly Coonce.

“We’re really happy that we got first in sectionals,” Sykstus said. “We just had so much great competition and sometimes it is hard to get first, as much we want to. It’s really great that we pulled it out today and we qualified a lot of girls. Everyone on our team did so good and everyone else at this sectional had a great meet.”

Perhaps no team was happier than the host Wildcats, who got 15 individuals and three relays through, including junior Gia Dalesandro, who was first in the 100 butterfly (56.58) and second in the backstroke.

Senior Taylor Eggenberger, who won the diving with 425.25 points for Waubonsie Valley.

“I’m super confident that we’ve only gotten halfway with tapering, so hopefully we’ll drop a huge chunk next weekend,” Dalesandro said. “I think as a team we’re all super excited because we all got our cuts and I think we got almost two cuts in every event.

“To get a trophy would be awesome. It’s going to be so hard but I think if we all have the perfect meet and we all do exceptionally well in our individuals and our relays all place in the top six, it’s not impossible. It’s something to work for.”

Naperville Central qualified nine individuals and three relays, while Naperville North advanced eight individuals and three relays. Oswego East is sending six individuals plus the 200 medley relay squad of sophomores Hannah McDowell, Emily Wulff and Sydney Lloyd and junior Erin Newman, which won in 1:47.14.

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