By: Carolyn M. Hartko
Looking out any window, it may seem like spring is far off. But the 2004-2005 winter season is drawing to a close for swimmers in the Greater Middlesex Conference. The South Brunswick High School swim teams have their final dual meet of the season tonight (Thursday) against Old Bridge.
Then there will be a week of practices to get everyone ready for the GMC Championships to be held at North Brunswick High School. The girls’ meet starts at 4:00 P.M. on Friday, Feb. 4, and the boys meet is at noon the following day.
Viking head coach John Harding is expecting both Old Bridge scores to be close. South has never lost to the Knights and Harding was hoping his squads would stay focused and healthy enough to pull off a double victory. That would give his swimmers positive momentum going into the county meet.
A pair of wins tonight would also be a big boost to team morale in what has turned out to be a very tough rebuilding year. The boys are 1-7 and the girls are 1-8.
"We’re having a rough rebuilding season," Harding said. "I kind of knew it was going to happen, but you add that to a combination of a tough meet, like the one with Piscataway that was close, and the fact that we dropped a couple of teams that we’ve beaten in the past, like Ewing and Cranford, and all of a sudden (the record) looks a lot worse than it really is."
Both teams lost last week to Montgomery and Piscataway, although the boys came close in an 86-78 loss to the Chiefs. The Vikings aced the 200 medley relay with a squad of Jamie Ruzycki, Brandon Lee, Mike Nicoara and Dan DeDeliviera. Lee went on to win the 100 yard breast stroke, the Vikes’ lone individual victory.
"Our depth kept us in the meet the entire way," Harding said. "We didn’t win many of the races, but if they won, we went two-three-four or two-three-five, so, we were right there. The guys swam really well, and we had some guys do personal best times. Travis Wardlow swam well in the 500 and the 200. Jim Gaylord had a good 200 free. Mike Nicoara and Brandon Lee did well in their races, Brandon in the 100 free and the 100 breast, and Mike in the 50 free and the 100 fly."
Harding has also been pleased with the progress of several freshman boys over the past few meets. Brian Dai missed the freshman record in the 100 backstroke by less than a second and Brian Lee missed his brother Brandon’s freshman record in the 100 fly by a 10th of a second.
Harding also mentioned Henry Ma, who’s been swimming exceptionally well in the 200 IM and the 100 breaststroke.
"It’s a good sign for the future when all these freshmen are doing so well," Harding said. "If the numbers keep up, and if these guys stick with it, we’re going to be in good shape in a few years."
SPLASHES: There was a technical controversy during the Piscataway meet that probably cost the Vikings the victory. The team did not have its lap counter boards with them as that equipment was still locked up in the pool area of Mercer County College. The boards are used to help the 500 yard long distance swimmers keep track of the number of laps (usually 20) in that race. Before the meet began, the two coaches discussed the problem, and Harding was led to believe that the Piscataway coach would allow the kids to swim, and not require a technical disqualification for the lack of equipment . . . "But then his first relay team was beating ours, and one kid got D.Q.’d for an early jump, which was his own kid’s fault," Harding said. "After the break, the coach decided to change his mind about being cool with the lap counters. He wanted the D.Q., and that’s what won him the meet. We ended up losing the meet by eight points, and the boys would have actually won it by two if we got to count the points in the 500. My kids didn’t do anything wrong we just didn’t have the necessary equipment at the pool. I wouldn’t want to win that way if I was the other coach, but that was his choice."

