Fountain Valley girls, Newport Harbor boys earn top-five finishes at CIF D1 swim finals
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WALNUT — Fountain Valley High School sophomore Alyssa Ton celebrated her Sweet 16 birthday on Saturday.
Ton gave herself two great gifts at the CIF Southern Section Division 1 Swimming Championships.
She won the girls’ 200- and 500-yard freestyle events going away, posting personal-best times in each event in the process.
“I didn’t know [the meet] was on my birthday until maybe a couple of weeks ago,” Ton said. “I think honestly, it’s pretty fun to have it on my birthday. To go lifetime bests in both [events] on my birthday, that’s really fun.”
The special talent helped the Barons’ girls place a strong third place as a team, up two spots from a year ago.
Newport Harbor’s boys set three school records at the Division 1 finals and finished tied for fifth as a team.
Ton repeated as Division 1 girls’ 200 freestyle champion, going out fast and cruising to a first-place finish in a time of 1 minute, 44.12 seconds.
“I wanted to go out pretty fast and see if I could hold on, and I think I did just that,” she said.
She won the girls’ 500 freestyle by nearly five seconds, cruising to the wall in 4:43.19. Fountain Valley coach Nathan Wilcox said that at Thursday’s meet preliminaries, Ton had broken the 1974 school record of Olympic champion Shirley Babashoff in the event. She lowered that time by more than a full second on Saturday.
She also swam leadoff as the Fountain Valley 200 medley relay team, which also featured senior Kaitlyn Nguyen, freshman Audrey Prall and senior Leyna Nguyen, touched third in 1:45.04.
Kaitlyn Nguyen finished second in the 200 IM and fourth in the breaststroke for the Barons, while Wilcox said his team also benefited from the improvement of Leyna Nguyen, who made the “A” final in the 50 free and the “B” final of the 100 freestyle.
“We’re building something really good at Fountain Valley,” Wilcox said. “We’re hoping that in three to five years, we’re up there with Santa Margarita and we have a chance of winning it every year. That’s the goal. That’s what we’re trying to build.”
Newport Harbor junior Connor Ohl won the boys’ 50 free in 20.04 seconds, a week after swimming a 19.79 at Sunset League finals to become the second Orange County boy to go under 20 seconds.
“I only wanted to win when I came here today, and that’s what I did,” said Ohl, who also placed fourth in the 100 freestyle. “It’s obviously not a 19, but to win any day is a great day. It’s awesome.”
Sailors senior Aidan Arie won the consolation final in the boys’ 200 IM in 1:48.83, a time that would have placed him second in the championship final. In doing so, he broke the school record in the event set by Olympic champion Aaron Peirsol in 2000.
It was the third individual school record of Arie’s high school career.
“[Peirsol] still has a standing world record, that’s the crazy part,” said Arie, who also took second place in the butterfly. “The 200 back is still his. I was looking at his record on the board, and I was like, ‘Can I do that?’ It’s pretty cool to take him down. I’m just stoked.”
Later in the meet, Arie also helped the Sailors also set school records in the 200 and 400 freestyle relays. The 200 free relay quartet of Dash D’Ambrosia, James Mulvey, Arie and Ohl touched third in 1:22.63, while the 400 free relay featuring the same swimmers in the same order also finished third in 3:01.63.
Newport Harbor coach Kevin Potter said the Sailors boys set school records in six of 11 events this year, while Arie also set the 500 freestyle record last year. The Newport Harbor pool is under reconstruction and set to reopen next school year.
“Next year, when that new record board goes up, it’s going to be a lot of new names on there,” Ohl said. “Mulvey and Dash really wanted to have their names on that board.”
Fountain Valley junior Peter Vu finished third in both of his individual events, the 200 IM and the breaststroke.
In the girls’ breaststroke event, CdM sophomore Sofia Szymanowski broke her own school record and placed a strong second in 1:00.79, less than four-tenths of a second behind repeat champion Bella Brito from Mira Costa. Szymanowski said a bee sting suffered during preliminaries affected her in her other strokes, but not as much in the breaststroke.
“I’m going to be sad when they’re graduated next year,” Symanowski said of Nguyen, who is her training partner in club swimming at Irvine Novaquatics, and Brito. “I just love racing against them.”
CdM’s Nikki Lahey, Szymanowski, Alex Milisavljevic and Kennedy Smith placed eighth in the medley relay, while Szymanowski, Milisavljevic, Josie Alaluf and Lahey were ninth in the 200 free relay. CdM’s girls also finished ninth as a team.
Lahey, a senior, capped her high school career with two individual championship finals. She was seventh in the girls’ 100 free and eighth in the 50 free.
Edison junior Holden Lee also made two championship finals, finishing fourth in the boys’ backstroke and eighth in the butterfly.
Costa Mesa’s boys, who had won the Division 3 championship in 2023 and the Division 2 title last year, found the going more tough in Division 1. Still, Mustangs junior Avrum Xagorarakis was the consolation champion in the 200 freestyle on Saturday.
Santa Margarita’s girls won their 11th straight CIF team title at the meet, while the Santa Margarita boys won their fifth straight crown.
Wilcox said that several his top Irvine Novaquatics club swimmers will now turn their attention to the USA Swimming National Championships, set for June 3-7 in Indianapolis. But Arie said he will compete at the CIF State Swimming Championships, which begin Friday at Clovis Olympic Swim Complex.
Division 2
Marina senior Jadyn Chaffins finished fifth in the 50 free on Friday at Mt. SAC, touching in 24.59 seconds and ending her career as the second-fastest in the event in Vikings history.
Among other swimmers in championship finals, Costa Mesa sophomore Melanie Pang placed sixth in the 100 breaststroke and Sage Hill senior Dylan Rosmann finished fifth in the boys’ 100 freestyle.
Division 3
Ocean View sophomore Thai Nguyen placed ninth in the boys’ 100 breaststroke, pacing local finishers on Friday at Mt. SAC.
Division 4
Ocean View’s girls placed ninth as a team at the finals Thursday at Mt. SAC.
Seahawks senior Morgan Carles placed top three in each of her individual events. She was second in the 100 backstroke in 59.68 and third in the 100 freestyle in 53.11. Fellow Ocean View senior Gabrielle Singer was eighth in the 100 free.
The Ocean View girls’ 400 free relay team of Singer, Gaby Zifcak, Serena Ruiz and Carles placed third in 4:01.90.
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