In the world of competitive sports, its rare too see a team accomplish all that they set out to do and then repeat it the next year. 2010 was a phenomenal year for the Mesa Womens Swim and Dive team, which left the 2011 team with big shoes to fill.
Last year’s team had 8 Conference Champions as well as winning Conference Champion as a team.
In 2011, many seasoned athletes returned from last season including Pacific Coast Athletic Conference Diver of the Year Katie Gibson. A few freshmen joined the team also who have shown some outstanding promise.
A successful season brought them to the PCAC Championships where the team finished second behind Palomar College.
Freshman Monique Beltran finished as Conference Champion in the 100 meter individual medley, 200 yard individual medley, and the 100 yard butterfly according to the PCAC official website.
Sophomore Katie Gibson, who won PCAC Diver of the Year for the second time, placed first in both 1 meter and 3 meter dives and then went on to finish second at the Southern California Championships.
A stellar performance left the women feeling good about their chances at state. Mesa sent six athletes to the state meet.
Unfortunately, while practicing, Gibson broke her foot and could not compete and had to cut her season short. “[It’s] unfortunate, she had a great year,” said Head Coach Jim Fegan.
Monique Beltran placed for both the 100-yard individual medley and the 100-yard butterfly, finishing sixth and fifth in those events respectively. “[I felt] pretty good, I think I could have done a little better with practice,” said Beltran of her performance. Freshman Karissa Seaman also qualified for two events. She finished seventh in the 50-yard breaststroke and finished seventh in 100-yard breaststroke. “For a freshman to final in two events is a pretty good performance,” said Fegan
Sereena Castillo finished eighth in the 1650-yard freestyle, the longest of all the events.
Mesa finished 15th in state possibly due to the rather small team this year. “I was real happy with the performance at state, we were just too small,” said Fegan.