Splash swim team in top 20 at winter JOs

Costa Mesa-based Splash Aquatics’ swim team competed at a recent winter Junior Olympics meet in Palm Springs and collected a top-20 finish in the men’s competition and had two swimmers reach finals.

Splash finished 19th out of 29 scoring teams in the men’s division with 114 points during the mid-December meet. Jakob Otte of Huntington Beach, 14, and 10-year-old Ellie Scalzo of Newport Beach each placed in the top-five in individual races.

Otte took fourth in the 100-yard breaststroke in the 13-14 division with a team-record time of 1 minute, 8.53 seconds, while Scalzo grabbed fifth in the 100 breaststroke in the 5-10 division with a 1:29.27.

Otte also set a team-record in the 200 breaststroke with a 2:37.75 in prelims.

Several other swimmers recorded top-16 finishes. They were: Nathan Fernandez, 13, Jacob Chalabian, 10, Jack Marquis, 9, George Andriashvili, 10, Vera Allen, 10, and Scalzo.

Fernandez established a team record in the 100 butterfly with a 59.14 in prelims.

Other swimmers who represented Splash were: Jana Akins, 8, Katie Tully, 10, Mason Shaff, 9, Gabi Higgs, 11, Alessandra Gonzalez, 12, Caden Jardim, 12, Delaney Lewellyn, 14, Luke Ismagil, 14, and Cameron Granger, 14.

— Reader submission