Swimming: Cleveland seeking sweep of City boys’ and girls’ titles

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For all its recent success in the pool, Cleveland has never won the City Section boys’ and girls’ team titles in the same season. The Cavaliers will try to do just that in the finals Wednesday at the John C. Argue Pool, which is next to the Coliseum.

Going into the season, Palisades, on depth alone, looked as if was a lock to capture its third straight girls’ title. Cleveland’s performance at last week’s preliminary meet, however, makes it a serious threat to dethrone the Dolphins.

One thing is certain: Palisades won’t run away with the title like it did last spring, when it lapped Venice by 131 points. The finals will likely be decided by the relays and the 500 freestyle, in which the Dolphins have four qualifiers to the Cavaliers’ three. Olivia Dill earned Cleveland valuable points by placing fifth at Friday’s diving finals.

Cleveland Coach Teresa Frias figures to rest easier with her boys’ squad, which is a favorite to three-peat. San Pedro and Birmingham are the main challengers. Cleveland had the best qualifying marks in the 200 individual medley and 100 breaststroke and senior Ashkaun Hami qualified first in the 100 butterfly and 100 backstroke.

Individually, defending champion Chelsea Lim of Taft was the top qualifier in the girls’ 50 and 100 freestyle events, Granada Hills’ Bianca Valencia qualified first in the 100 butterfly and Cleveland’s Jessica Chong was the top qualifier in the 100 breaststroke.

Phillip Chu of Sherman Oaks CES is favored to defend the boys’ 200 individual medley and 100 breaststroke titles. The closest race of the day figures to be the 50 freestyle, in which Edward Kwak’s prelim time was less than a 10th of a second better than David Portillo’s of Cleveland and Taft teammate Nico Kryspin’s.

-- Steve Galluzzo