Granada Hills Makes a Splash

Granada Hills High is used to winning City Section swimming titles.

But for the first time in seven years, it was the boys’ team which captured the glory.

Despite fielding one of the smallest teams in the competition, Granada Hills lapped the field at Belmont Plaza in Long Beach on Wednesday, accumlating 220 points to win the program’s first City championship.

Palisades finished second with 148 points, followed by Birmingham (137), Cleveland (134) and El Camino Real (122).

The Highlanders won without their best swimmer, Tyler Clark, who broke a leg this week and didn’t compete.

“We’re really well-rounded and I think that’s what won it for us,” said co-Coach Kevin Blum. “We don’t have any depth. We only have [12] guys on our squad and only eight swam [Wednesday.]”

Blum said the boys were motivated by the success of the Highlanders’ girls team, which had won six consecutive City Section titles.

“We used to get so pumped about the girls, with all the success they’ve had. Maybe this year, it rubbed off on us,” he said.

William Baier of Granada Hills won the 500-yard freestyle in 5:03.01 and finished second in the 100 freestyle (50.29) behind Keun Rhee of Kennedy (48.64).

Steven Park of Granada Hills won the 50 freestyle in 22.74 seconds and was second in the 100 breaststroke with a time of 1:00.49. Brett Brown of El Camino Real won in 59.45.

Tony Kim of Granada Hills won the 100 backstroke in 1:02.60.

The Highlanders dominated the relays, scoring twice as many points as in individual events. Park, Ryan Yoshinaga, Baier and Ilya Novichenok prevailed in the 400 freestyle relay in 3:28.66.

El Camino Real’s girls finished second for the fourth consecutive year. The Conquistadores totaled 260 points, second to Palisades, which won its 15th City title at 287.

Cleveland was third with 146 points and Granada Hills finished fourth with 126. Grant was fifth with 111.

Cleveland senior Amy Jones, the City record holder in the 50, 100 and 200 freestyles and 100 butterfly, chose to try new events.

She won the 500 freestyle, then out-touched Elizabeth Inai of El Camino Real to win the 100 backstroke by 35 hundredths of a second in 1:00.60.

“I did all right. I wanted to do a little better, but I had to swim three events all within about ten minutes, so I got a little tired,” said the Princeton-bound Jones, who never lost an individual event in high school.