Youthful Bobcats earn stripes at state

With no seniors in the swimming group, experiencing the atmosphere of the jam-packed Linda Bloom Natatorium for Saturday’s finals, whether it was for the first time or the third time, can only help the Bobcats as they grow over the offseason in preparation for next fall.

“It’s excellent, not just for swimming, but for leadership,” MHS head coach Angie Nelson said. “Once you’ve been in these big-pressure meets, you start to handle yourself a little bit differently. And that leadership and experience just goes a long way.”

The Bobcats finished 27th as a team with 15 points in the 2024 swimming and diving meet, with all the points coming from diver Kate Hauser’s fourth-place finish in Friday’s diving finals.

The day started with the 200-yard medley relay, where Emma Case, Adele Beek, Maisie Gummert and Rachel Case finished 28th in 1 minute, 59.23 seconds.

T-R PHOTO BY JAKE RYDER – Marshalltown sophomore Leia Hernandez swims the anchor leg of the 400-yard freestyle relay during Saturday’s state swimming championships at the Marshalltown YMCA-YWCA. The foursome of Maisie Gummert, Drea Ceren, Emma Case and Hernandez placed 25th in 3 minutes, 49.85 seconds.

“We were a little flat there,” Nelson said. “Decent splits, nothing completely out of line, … but those girls just gave everything they had in that moment.”

A couple hours later, the 200 freestyle relay of Leia Hernandez, Libby Meyer, Adele Beek and Rachel Case went up and grabbed 27th in 1:45.24; like the medley relay, it was slightly slower than the regional time, but featured another solid performance from Meyer who Nelson said has come on strong late in the season.

“She had never swam under a 27 second split until conference,” Nelson added. “Then she went 26 flat at the regional meet and held on today for a 26.2, and I couldn’t be more thrilled with that performance.

“Everybody swam well, we just weren’t exactly on fire today. When you’re at regionals, you’re gunning for something, you know what your goal is. And I think our first two relays got a little lost in the mix today, taking the pace set for them by their neighbor, which can be a bit of a trap where you end up being comparable to what you run, but not the fastest you can be.”

The Bobcats emptied the tank in the 400 freestyle relay, with Gummert, Drea Ceren, Emma Case and Hernandez finishing 25th in 3:49.85, a two-second drop from the regional time and improving on the relay’s 26th-place seeding as every relay member saw a time drop.

“That was a great relay,” Nelson said. “Everyone swam really, really well, and that’s a lot of time moved. 55.3 for Leia was a nice way to cap off her year. She’s had a great year, and I wanted to see her turn it on there, and she turned it on at the right time today.”

With three freshman coming off the blocks into the pool on Saturday, next year and beyond looks very promising for the Bobcats.

“This is a group of girls that gets along really, really well,” Nelson said. “They hang out together, train together, eat together — I think they’re regulars at Culver’s, I’m not sure if they ever leave when it closes — this is a group that’s just going to continue to grow together.”

No better place to grow and experience than Marshalltown and the state meet at the YMCA-YWCA, and the passionate staff and volunteers that make it happen, Nelson said.

“This meet takes a ton of work,” Nelson said. “The Y staff is absolutely incredible, and they’ve been doing this long enough now where they’ve got a really good system here, and are always proactive and looking and what they can fix, what they can make better. And then they pull in a community of volunteers that makes things run smoothly, whether it’s timers, deck helpers, deck work, we couldn’t do all of this without that army of volunteers.”

The contract with the IGHSAU and Marshalltown YMCA-YWCA has yet to be renewed after a five-year renewal signed in 2017 was extended through this year. The IGHSAU has received inquiries from other facilities to host the meet but a decision on the future of the meet is not expected until early next year.

The IHSAA moved the boys state swimming meet from Marshalltown to Iowa City in 2017, after the Y hosted the boys meet for 13 years.

“This is, by far, the number one spectator experience at a state championship, hands down,” Nelson said. “We’ve been to some of these other pools, and they’re nice pools, they’re great — but no one else has the spectator experience that we provide here at the Marshalltown Y. When they do an event here, they do it right, they pull out all the stops, and they’re always looking at ways to make it better for every swimmer here.”

IGHSAU State Swimming and Diving Meet

Team Standings — 1. Dowling Catholic 260, 2. Waukee Northwest 243, 3. Cedar Falls 220, 4. Bettendorf 216, 5. Ames 191, 6. Sioux City West 127, 7. Pleasant Valley 116, 8. Iowa City West 89, 9. Iowa City High 88, 10. Southeast Polk 85, 11. Johnston 82, 12. Fort Dodge 61.5, 13. Newton 56, 14. Waterloo West 54, 15. West Des Moines Valley 49, 16. Spencer 48, 17. Dubuque Wahlert 44, 18. Grinnell 36, 19. Dubuque Senior 34, 20. Perry 32, 21. Cedar Rapids Kennedy 27.5, 22. Des Moines North 27, 22. Waukee 27, 22. Cedar Rapids Washington 27, 25. Linn-Mar 24, 26. Lewis Central 18, 27. Marshalltown 15, 28. Davenport Central 11, 29. Ankeny 9, 30. Algona 7.

MHS RESULTS

DIVING — 4. Kate Hauser, 417.95.

200 MEDLEY RELAY — 28. Emma Case, Adele Beek, Maisie Gummert, Rachel Case, 1:59.23.

50 FREESTYLE — 20. Leia Hernandez, 25.32.

100 BUTTERFLY — 30. Emma Case, 1:03.35.

200 FREESTYLE RELAY — 27. Leia Hernandez, Libby Meyer, Adele Beek, Rachel Case, 1:45.24.

100 BREASTSTROKE — 29. Adele Beek, 1:11.21.

400 FREESTYLE RELAY — 25. Maisie Gummert, Drea Ceren, Emma Case, Leia Hernandez, 3:49.85.