Carlmont swimming riding high

This year, Derek Koo, one of Farley’s former students with the Otter Swim Club, takes over and has the Scots poised at another run at PAL supremacy.

“I obviously have huge shoes to fill,” Koo said. “I was one Fred’s swimmers when I was in high school. I’ve known him for a very long time. … I am blessed that I’ve been able to be mentored by him. A lot of my philosophies are along the same lines as him. So, I’ve kept it mostly the same to the best of my ability. But, yeah, realistically it’s all the swimmers doing all the hard work. I just yell at them.”

The Carlmont boys’ team will have its hands full contending with Aragon and Menlo-Atherton at the PAL championship meet, with the finals scheduled for Saturday, April 30 at M-A. The Gentleman Scots are currently in third place in the PAL Bay Division dual meet standings, sitting behind Aragon and M-A, who are tied for first.

With the Carlmont girls’ team winning 104-67 in Friday’s dual meet at Woodside, though, the Lady Scots take outright control of first place in the PAL Bay dual meet standings.

But everyone knows it’s the postseason meet where PAL championships are decided.

“I think it’s more the psychological aspect, where it’s like: ‘Hey, we’ve been winning all the dual meets,’” Woodside senior Emma Elliott said.

While Elliott was busy taking second place in all her events — the 50 freestyle, the 100 breaststroke, and anchor legs in the 200 and 400 free relays — it was the Carlmont boys’ team enjoying its day in the sun with a strong finish to score a dramatic 91-75 win over Woodside.

With three events to go, Woodside led 61-60 following a first-place swim in the 200 free relay, anchored by freshman Seth Collet.

But the Scots went on to run the table in the final three boys’ events. In the boys’ 100 breast, Joshua Liu fronted a big swing on the scoreboard. Hu won the event in 59.42 seconds, while Myles Hu took second in 1:00.75, and Augustin Sherrer took fourth in 1:10.22. In the 100 breast, Carlmont’s Zerach Chan won it in 1:05.05. And in the boys’ 400 free relay, Carlmont senior Billy Picht anchored the winning time of 3:30.59.

“We thought we had beat Woodside by more, but this was really close,” Picht said. “Super intense meet, lots of fun and we’re so glad Woodside had a lot of cheering and spirit going on too, because that makes it more fun.”

Picht — who is committed to swim next year at UC Santa Barbara — was swimming with the proverbial chip on his shoulder after losing in the 100 free earlier in the day, with Collet winning the event in 48.30, topping Picht’s second-place time of 49.75. Picht was disappointed in the final 400 free relay, however, when Collet did not swim for Woodside, having already topped out at four events on the day.

“Unfortunately, he wasn’t swimming the 400 free relay, which would have been a great race between us,” Picht said.

Carlmont has plenty of depth, especially on the girls’ roster.

“I look at that meet sheet and I have kind of a hard time trying to figure out who to put where,” Koo said. “Again, they’re all very versatile. There’s a million ways I can shake it, and I’m pretty sure that they’ll all do well regardless of what I put them in.”