The Kingwood Mustang girls and boys swim teams both reached the medal podium at the
close of the 2010 UIL Swimming and Diving State Championships on Feb. 27 at the University of Texas, but with a reversal of results from last year. The Kingwood girls won the Class 5-A state championships after finishing third a year ago and the defending state champion boys took third place this time.

The girls’ title came down to the last event: the 400 yard freestyle relay. Due to a disqualification of the Southlake Carroll relay team in preliminaries, a safe finish in finals was all Kingwood needed to seal the win. But they did better than that. Kingwood finished second with Jillian Vitarius, Katheryn Nolen, Madeline Hazle and a strong anchor leg by Michelle Gean who out-touched four other teams at the wall.

Kingwood scored 167 points overall, 21 points ahead of San Antonio Churchill and 29 more than Southlake Carroll. The Mustangs had not won a girls title since 2004. What is remarkable about the results is that they were achieved with just six swimmers and only one first place in an individual event.

“They had a terrific meet,” said Kingwood Head Coach Russell Duin. “Everyone battled for points and remembered the goal: to win state. It was a great team effort.”

The sole gold medal event was the 200 yard freestyle relay. The team of Leah Pfitzer, Gean, Hazle and Jamie Friderichs took first in 1:35.71 – breaking the school record set just last year. The win was redemption for the 200 yard medley relay in which Vitarius, Hazle, Pfitzer and Friderichs took second place by just one tenth of a second.

Four Mustang girls placed in individual events. Vitarius got second in the 100 yard backstroke and tenth in the 200 yard freestyle. During the backstroke preliminaries, she broke her own school record clocking a 53.98. Gean took fifth in the 100 yard freestyle and 14th in the 100 yard breaststroke. During the preliminaries, the senior established herself as the second fastest 100 freestyler in Mustang history with a time of 51.21 – just one hundredth of a second off of the school record. Freshman Hazle was seventh in the 200 yard individual medley and sophomore Friderichs was 13th in the 50 yard freestyle and 15th in the 500 yard freestyle.

Gean, the only senior on the championship squad, was nostalgic coming off her fourth state swim meet. “It’s really a privilege to be a part of the Mustang tradition and win the state championships,” she said. “It’s a bittersweet finale to my high school career, but I couldn’t ask for a better closure on four great years with the Mustangs. I’m so proud of my teammates. They worked hard and really made this year one of the best.”

Matt Barber, a senior headed to swim at Arizona University, had an equally emotional ending to his high school swimming career. After placing in the top eight in the 500 yard freestyle at three state championships, Barber finally took first in the event in dominant
style. Clocking a 4:22.08, he smashed his own school record set as a sophomore by over six seconds. He also won the 200 yard freestyle in 137.30, lowering the team record by two seconds.

Barber swam the butterfly leg in the gold medal winning boys 200 yard medley relay, joined by seniors Ryan Glander and Joseph Bergmeister and sophomore Jordan Jones. He was the anchor swimmer in the 400 yard freestyle relay, taking third place along with Jones, Will Oswald and Ryan Glander to solidify the team’s overall bronze medal. The state meet was won by The Woodlands boys with Southlake Carroll taking second in team competition.

A total of nine Kingwood boys contributed to the team effort. Jones took fourth in the 200 yard IM and sixth in the 100 yard freestyle with Patrick Pash placing 13th in the event. Ryan Glander was fourth in the 100 yard backstroke and 11th in the 200 freestyle. His brother Mitch also placed 11th in the 500 freestyle. Bergmeister was 12th in the 100 yard breaststroke and was a member of the sixth place 200 yard freestyle relay team joined by Pash, Steve Ciliske and Hayden Polenz.

Complete meet results are available at www.tisca.org