Canyon Finally Swamps Villa Park in Girls’ Swimming

Robin Lieberman had been waiting for this moment for four years.

And it finally came Wednesday, as Canyon defeated Villa Park in Century League girls’ swimming at Villa Park.

“Since I was a freshman, it’s always been Villa Park,” Lieberman said after finishing second to teammate Shevva Khalafbeigi in the 100 yard butterfly. “But the team really wanted this. I mean, we really wanted to beat them and it means the world to us.”

Canyon Coach Mike Giles, who had been preparing his Canyon girls for this meet since spring break, said his team was as ready as it would ever be.

“We’ve never beaten them, and we had a good team this year. So we’ve been waiting for this meet all season,” Giles said.

Canyon, which won every event in the meet, finished with 104 points to Villa Park’s 66. The Comanches are the Century League champions in dual-meet competition at 5-0. Villa Park is tied for second with Foothill and El Modena at 3-2.

One clear edge for Canyon was versatile freshman Erin Volcan. She is strong in all four strokes and offers Canyon flexibility when putting relay teams together. Along with her sister, Lauren, a junior, the two gave Canyon victories in four events and they swam on two of the three winning relays.

Erin Volcan won the 500 freestyle in a school-record time of 5 minutes 5.56 seconds and the the 100 backstroke (1:01.85). Volcan’s time in the 500 free was 30 seconds ahead of runner-up Cindy Henn of Villa Park. Lauren Volcan won the 100 (54.58) and 200 freestyles (2:03.58). Besides the 100 fly, Khalafbeigi won the 50 freestyle in 25.81. Darby Schlaht won the 200 individual medley (2:18.74) and the 100 breaststroke (1:10.42).

In the boys’ meet, Villa Park easily beat Canyon, 127-40.

Chris Greene won the 50 (22.47) and 100 freestyles (50.63). Greene also swam the anchor leg on the winning 200 medley relay, which clocked 1:45.34, the county’s fourth fastest time this season.

The Spartans also won the 200 and 400 freestyle relays. All three of the Spartan relay teams had Southern Section qualifying times.