Swim State Champions: 3-Peat for Orange Coast women, back-to-back for Sierra Men
Orange Coast wins its 21st state meet women's championship
MONTEREY PARK - Orange Coast College continued its dynasty in women's swimming by winning its 21st state championship while Sierra captured its second consecutive men's title at the 2022 CCCAA State Swimming and Diving Championships that concluded Saturday at East Los Angeles College.
OCC won its third straight title after winning in 2018 and 2019 (2020-2021 no state meets held due to COVID-19 pandemic). The Pirates have won nearly half (21 of 43) all of the state meets held going back to 1978 when the sport was officially sanctioned at the California Community College level. In the '22 meet, Orange Coast won by a decisive 141.5 points over second-place Sierra.
The Pirates were led by Giselle Quinonez, who scored event wins in the 500-freestyle and 1,650 freestyle, and four relay titles out of a possible five overall. Sude Yilmazturk, Delaney Lewellyn, Yuuri Yoshikawa, and Journey Werner were other top Pirates swimmers.
Orange Coast head coach Anthony Iacopetti talked about why his program has sustained success over time and how he was able to keep the quality of his program going despite the setbacks made by COVID-19.
"First, we are in a great area for swimming," he said. "But I think one of the keys is to get to know your athletes. By understanding what makes a kid tick, it helps as a coach to motivate them and inspire them to be better. You look around the state, and you find that some of the most successful coaches have been at their schools for quite a while. I've been an assistant since 2004 at OCC, but I didn't truly take over our women's program until 2011.
"We have some kids this year who a few were with us in 2020. One of the challenges we had was to re-engage the swimmers to commitment to team and to the college environment. For many, we had a lot of zooms back then. We just had to get them back in the pool."
Sierra picked up its third title, also winning the previous state meet held at De Anza College in 2019 after winning the school's first men's crown in 2016. Sierra's championship was propelled by three event victories by Co-Men's Swimmer of the Year in Jake Reuter, including the 200 and 400 IM titles, and two from Andrew Espinosa. The Wolverines led throughout the meet and won by 124 points over second-place Orange Coast.
Sierra head coach Chris Breitbart said his team's victory was bittersweet after receiving difficult news, "We dedicated this meet to my assistant coach Bruce Hastie who has been with me the whole way in our program. Unfortunately he was just diagnosed with stage 4 cancer and I think the swimmers knew just how important this meet was for us. It was tough for me to not have him by my side here.
"We knew we were facing a worthy opponent in Orange Coast, but it's been our goal all year to win the state title. Coach Hastie and I have preached to buy in to our practices and workout schedule. So either they get on the ship or get off it. Espinosa really stepped up for us here and he was with us in 2020, and hadn't had the chance to be in a state meet until this one. Jake and Andrew were big contributors and the team as a whole stayed the course."
Co-Men's Swimmers of the Meet: Jake Reuter, Sierra, 200 IM, 400 IM, 200 breaststroke titles; Ethan Smith, Orange Coast, 50 freestyle, 100 butterfly, 200 butterfly titles
Women's Swimmer of the Meet: Risa Akatsu, Santa Monica, 200 IM, 200 freestyle, 200 butterfly titles
Men's Performance of the Meet: Ethan Smith, Orange Coast, 200 butterfly
Women's Performance of the Meet: Rylee Beidleman, Modesto, 200 breaststroke
Men's Swim Coach of the Year: Co-Coaches--Bruce Hastie, Chris Breitbart, Sierra
Women's Swim Coach of the Year: John Marsh, Cuesta
Men's Diver of the Year: Donovan Taylor, Palomar, won 3-meter board title, 2nd in 1-meter board
Women's Diver of the Year: Lorelai Carney, Riverside City, won both 1-meter and 3-meter board titles
WOMEN'S FINAL STANDINGS: 1. Orange Coast 469, 2. Sierra 327.5, 3. Cuesta 224, 4. Long Beach CC 203, 5. Santa Barbara CC 200, 6. Diablo Valley 189, 7. San Diego Mesa 185, 8. San Joaquin Delta 164, T9. Riverside CC, Santa Monica 160.
MEN'S FINAL STANDINGS: 1. Sierra 573, 2. Orange Coast 449, 3. Cuesta 340, 4. American River 268, 5. Golden West 241, 6. Diablo Valey 238, 7. Palomar 195, 8. Sequoias 161.5, 9. West Valley 144, 10. Mt. San Antonio 142.
Saturday, May 7
Event #29: W-1,650 freestyle: Champion--Giselle Quinonez, Orange Coast, 18:05.32, 2. Faith Tan, Sacramento CC, 18:39.51, 3. Laila Topinio, Mt. San Antonio, 18:41.15. Quinonez was the prohibitive favorite and did not waver as she won the mile swim in a dominating 34 plus seconds ahead of 2nd place Tan of Sac City. Quinonez stayed ultra consistent from her opening 30.80 until her final of 33.06 leg. Quinonez won her 2nd distance title of the meet.
Event #30: M-1,650 freestyle: Champion--Ethan Umpornpuckdi, Cypress, 16:22.10, 2. Stash Perry, 16:29.95, 3. Tommy Collins, Sierra, 16:35.92. Umpornpuckdi overtook favorite Perry at the 250-yard mark and never looked back as the Cypress swimmer won the mile swim by 7.85 seconds. Umpornpuckdi beat the previous '22 best time by 14 seconds. When many were laboring late, the sophomore swam mostly in the 29s in the final half of the race.
Event #31: W-200 backstroke: Champion--Ryanne Bartolome, Cuesta, 2:05.07, 2. Ruby Gonzalez, Santa Rosa, 2:08.75, Atiya Yuwana, Long Beach, 2:12.32 3. The speedy Cougar won her second backstroke event and beat the state's fastest time in '22 by 1.6 seconds. Bartolome had the fastest start at 29.56 and the fastest closing 50 at 31.53.
Event #32: M-200 backstroke: Champion--Tatsuki Inouye, Orange Coast, 1:47.61, 2. Matthew Simpson, Orange Coast, 1:49.17, 3. Evan Terry, Sierra, 1:49.55. Inouye collects his second gold, edging out teammate Simpson by .38. Inouye's final 50 did the job as he was 1.46 faster than Simpson's last 50.
Event #33: W-100 freestyle: Champion--Camryn Bussey, Sierra, 52.90, 2. Jillian Lambert, Sequoias, 53.01, 3. Ensley Letterman, Santa Barbara 53.62. Bussey stormed out to a halfway lead in 25.01 but Lambert fired off a 27.40 final 50 and just missed catching Bussey, who won by just .11.
Event #34: M-100 freestyle: Champion--Andrew Espinosa, Sierra, 45.13, 2. Lucas Esenwein, Cuesta, 45.35, Joshy Peters, Sequoias, 45.44. Espinosa scores his 2nd win with a '22 fastest time as he edged out Esenwein by .22 and Peters in .31. A strong finish saw five swimmers go below 46 with Sasha Gusev (Diablo Valley) in 45.74 in 4th and Orange Coast's Andrew Leong in 45.79 for 5th.
Event #35: W-200 breaststroke: Champion--Rylee Beidleman, Modesto JC, 2:21.99, 2. Sydney Fortune, San Diego Mesa, 2:26.30, 3. Ashley Sand, Las Positas, 2:29.06. Beidleman scores her second title win with the state's fastest time this year. Beidleman's second 50 was huge as she swam 35.33 allowing her to take the lead as her furious pace allowed her to win by by more than 4 seconds.
Event #36: M-200 breaststroke: Champion--Jake Reuter, Sierra, 2:01.42, 2. Srboljub Filipovic, Golden West, 2:02.52, 3. Aidan Cumming, Santa Rosa, 2:03.21. Reuter went hard for his 3rd gold of the meet as he started with a 27.06 split and followed with a 30.02. It allowed him to maintain enough room to score a 1.10 second victory over Filipovic.
Event #37: W-200 butterfly: Champion--Risa Akatsu, Santa Monica, 2:08.42, 2. Kanyada Doughty, Hartnell, 2:14.59, 3. Natalie Johnston, San Joaquin Delta, 2:21.94. Akatsu was pumped up for her third event win, but maybe a little too energized as she completed her first 100 in a blistering 59.14 seconds. While she easily won the race, she could not keep up the fast pace and while not the fastest time of the year, she had set that mark in the prelims at 2:07.76.
Event #38: M-200 butterfly: Champion--Ethan Smith, Orange Coast, 1:46.78, 2. Aidan Thompson, Sierra, 1:51.03, 3. Caleb Tracy, Sierra, 1:52.29. Smith challenged the state meet record of Tom Zafares (2006, Cabrillo) but came up 1.14 seconds short in a brilliant swim. Smith joined Reuter in the 3-gold club.
Event #39: W-400 freestyle relay: Champion--Orange Coast, 3:37.39 (Sude Yilmazturk, Giselle Quinonez, Delaney Lewellyn, Journey Werner), 2. Sierra, 3:40.15, 3. Cuesta, 3:41.18. The Pirates won their fourth relay title of the meet with Quinonez again being a key figure with her 51.85 split from the second leg.
Event #40: M-400 freestyle relay: Champion--Orange Coast, 3:00.93 (Tatsuki Inoue, Andrew Leong, Matthew Simpson, Ethan Smith), 2. Sierra 3:02.52, 3. Golden West, 3:08.53. While Sierra enjoyed the state team championship, the Pirates made their own statement by just missing out on the state meet record by .31 of a second. Smith swam a super-fast 44.47 anchor.
Release by Robert Lewis, CCCSIA/CCCAA State Swim Meet SID