O’Brien helps MHS to crown
By Justin Feil, Assistant Sports Editor
As a sophomore at Montgomery High School, Darby O’Brien was looking for a sport to do.
”My friend recommended swimming,” O’Brien said. “He said it was easy.”
O’Brien did not find that to be true, but it did get him in shape quickly. And everything else about being a part of the Cougar boys’ swim team appealed to him.
”I liked winning,” O’Brien said. “It felt nice. You have the whole team behind you supporting you. Montgomery has great pride in their teams.”
The Cougars have even more reason to be proud after they celebrated a first-ever win, their first Skyland Conference Championship title on Thursday. MHS, which had finished fourth in the Somerset County Championship the previous Saturday, leapfrogged over Hillsborough and Bridgewater-Raritan.
”We took the wins where we were supposed to,” said MHS head coach Noelle Keller. “The kids swam their times. I think they went into this meet with a lot more confidence. We had a lot of personal records broken on our team. I think they went into this meet with a lot more confidence than counties.”
MHS continued to climb in the standings. In O’Brien’s first year of swimming for the Cougars, they finished fourth at conferences. Last year, they tied Hillsborough for second place.
”It was a joy to win it,” O’Brien said. “Honestly, I went in thinking we’d get third or fourth after counties. But Pingry wasn’t there. That helped a lot with those first and second place spots.
”We usually do better in the conference meet. I think a lot of people were disappointed with the county meet. They wanted to go and give it their all and see what they could do. I think the sophomores and juniors helped a lot with those other events.”
Brian Stirling won the 50 free in a new meet record and his twin brother, Jeff, was fourth. O’Brien finished sixth to give the Cougars a whopping 36 points to move into first place for good and change the tenure of the meet for the Cougars.
”We’re a big freestyle team,” O’Brien said. “We have a lot of good freestylers. We got first, third and sixth. It helped a lot.
”After we got those points in the 50 free, I was standing in the shower,” he added. “I heard we’re in first place. We could still lose it at that point, but I was feeling confident in the team. I got a boost right there. I felt like, I have to try harder.”
Jeff Stirling followed with a record-time to win the 100 butterfly and Paul Schafer was just behind in third place. The Cougars continued to build their lead when Brian Stirling was third and O’Brien seventh in the 100 free. O’Brien’s swims contributed to the win.
”Darby only started swimming when he was a sophomore in high school,” Keller said. “This is Darby’s first year club swimming. He only swam high school his sophomore and junior year. After junior year, he was that good and decided he wanted to be a lot more serious. He joined SVY (club team) with the Stirlings.
”Darby is our sprint freestyler,” she added. “He’s just all muscle. He’s got the upper body strength and now that his stroke has smoothed out, he’s really pulled his stroke together. He just needed to fine-tune his stroke.”
O’Brien teamed up with Scott Heil and the Stirling brothers to finish second in the 200 freestyle relay after Mike Leddy was fourth and Alex Fagard fifth in the 500 free. Fagard earlier was second in the 200 individual medley. The Cougars still had the lead when the same 200 free relay team took to the pool for the 400 freestyle relay. MHS capped its day with a two-second win over Bridgewater.
”We really wanted to put the icing on the cake right there,” O’Brien said. “We came through. We didn’t false start or anything.
”We were pretty confident going into it. It’s all SVY people against all other SVY people. You look at Bridgewater, and they destroyed us when we were against them in the dual meet. They took such a lead out. We beat them this time.”
Improvement is a theme for the Cougars. Their first Skyland crown shows how much the team has grown through the years. They were ecstatic to finish second last year. They were still struggling for words to describe Thursday’s win days later.
”It’s pretty invaluable. We’ve never done it before,” Keller said. “I’ve watched this team go from fifth and sixth place in the conference now to No. 1. It just shows every single year we’re getting better and better and faster and faster and our depth is increasing every year. You have to have that depth.”
O’Brien is one of the best at providing depth. Behind the Stirlings, he gives the Cougars another strong sprinter. The 50 free provided a turning point for the conference crown.
”We went in knowing we had a job to do,” O’Brien said. “It came down to getting that lead. We knew we needed those top six places. We had a job to do.”
The Cougars hope to build on the conference win as they prepare for the upcoming state tournament. MHS will find out Wednesday where it is seeded in the Central Jersey A Division.
”It’s a real boost in confidence,” O’Brien said. “I think we’re going to go in and give it our all. We really want this. It would be so great to be a senior and go out with a sectional title.”
Already, winning the Skyland Conference meet has given O’Brien more than he ever expected. Swimming may not be easy, but Darcy O’Brien is thrilled with his decision to join the Cougars.
”I don’t know if I could have asked for anything better,” O’Brien said. “It was one of the best things I did.”