Neshaminy’s Brad Johnson, CB South’s Stephanie Nickerson and the Wissahickon girls’ team are featured in this week’s notebook.
National Conference
Brad Johnson is a senior captain for the Neshaminy boys team, but he’s been a leader on the team for a long time.
“Being a leader on Neshaminy is a lot different than being a leader on some other teams,” Johnson said. “Everyone who’s a veteran is expected to be a leader. The captains are just supposed to hold the team together and initiate everything.
“It’s really just one big group of people who want to swim and want everyone to improve and it’s a great environment.
“The team is doing great. We’ve got a lot of new bodies and a lot of good swimmers. Again, most of them are new but they’re dropping times like mad so I can only look forward to how they’re going to swim at SOLs (conference championship meet).
The Redskins entered the holiday break with a record of 1-3 overall, 0-1 in the conference.
“We were hoping to get another win against Central Bucks South (a 109-74 loss on Dec. 21),” Johnson said. “Almost across the board everyone’s times were dropping and strokes are improving, so even though we lost that one it was a close meet and we had so much improvement.
“I can’t wait to see what happens after the holidays. In meets like that, you learn a lot even if you don’t win, especially for the younger kids.”
Johnson knows what motivates him.
“There’s nothing more encouraging than to push off on your turn and just out of the corner of your eye you see the cap of the person next to you,” he said. “You just want to keep your head down and go and beat them, forget about everything and look for the wall.”
He has set goals for himself this year.
“I’d like to finally make the 50 freestyle at districts, and hopefully the 100 freestyle or 100 butterfly and I’d like to swim in multiple relays,” he said.“It would be nice to have more than one event and it would be really nice to have a choice of what individual events I got to swim, but we’ll just have to see what happens.”
Continental Conference
Stephanie Nickerson is a rebel.
The Central Bucks South junior is a distance freestyler living in a diving family.
Older brother Matthew is a sophomore on the La Salle University diving team and younger brother Nash competes in the 14-15 age group for Centennial Diving.
“They’re always telling me that I don’t practice very hard but of course that’s not true, I do practice very hard,” Nickerson said. “I love my brothers, but diving just wasn’t for me.”
She struck out on her own and found herself enjoying the distance events.
“The 500 freestyle is one of my favorites,” she said. “I feel like after I get that beat going I just like having a pace and to just keep on going. I like that event a lot and I think I can do well in it.”
She is ambitious for herself.
“I’d like to make district cuts in at least four individual events,” she said. “I’ve already made it in the 500 freestyle and the 200 individual medley. I’m really close in the 100 backstroke and I haven’t done the 200 freestyle yet but we’ve only had a couple of meets so I’m not worried.
“I’d like to make it in a lot of events so I have a lot of options about what to swim, and not be locked into a couple of events because that’s all I qualified for, and I just love being able to have diverse events.
“I’d also like to see our relays make it as well.”
She is excited about her team’s prospects this year.
“I think our team has a lot of depth,” she said. “I also think we’re going to have a lot of improvement and I can’t wait to see it.”
Coach Kevin Murray appreciates having Nickerson on his team.
“She lives for swimming,” he said. “Most of the kids are like, ‘I don’t want to get in the pool again’ but she’s like ‘yes, it’s time for practice’ and that’s such a great attitude to have.”
American Conference
The Wissahickon girls are brimming with confidence this year.
“I expect a bunch of us to go to districts and at least three or four of us to go to states,” said senior captain Rachel Bohr.
“We have a really strong team this year and I really think we can do that. Last year we had about 12 girls go to districts and I think we can get more girls this year. We already have about 10 cuts from a few different girls so we’re really doing well.”
Fellow senior captain Liz McKenna is looking forward to their meeting with defending conference and District One Class AAA champion Upper Dublin on Monday, Feb. 6 at 6 p.m. at Upper Dublin.
“Upper Dublin is a very strong team, and they have more than just the front line of swimmers who win events,” she said. “They have the second swimmers to take those middle places are they stack up the points.
“Our girls have been stepping up this year and we have a stronger core so I think we’re going to have a better meet with them this year. That’s a meet that we really gear up for and try to get our best times at. Their pool is so nice, every chance we get to swim there we try to do our best.”
The Trojans entered the holiday break 2-0 overall, 1-0 in the conference with a non-league win over Central Bucks South and a conference win over Cheltenham.
“CB South was a big win for us,” senior Carrie Johnson said. “We’re really pleased with that. Going into the break undefeated is a great feeling.
“We want to take the momentum from before the break and hopefully carry that over into the rest of the season.”
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