Linn-Mar Girls Swimming

Drake claims 2 gold medals at state swim

MARSHALLTOWN - Linn-Mar sophomore Kelsey Drake came home from the state swimming meet Saturday with two gold medals and one slightly embarrassing confession.

The embarrassing moment came a few minutes after Drake captured the 200 individual medley by a scant 5-hundredths of a second in an exhausting race.

She left the pool deck and spilled her guts, to put it as delicately as possible.

"I was dehydrated after my 200 IM," Drake explained. "I didn't feel good. I had a headache and I kind of threw up a little bit. It was stressful."

Fortunately, Drake managed to leave the pool deck before the unfortunate episode.

"It wasn't in the pool," she said with a relieved smile. "Thank God."

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Deuso, Lengwin place 7th-8th in diving

MARSHALLTOWN - Alyssa Deuso and Mikaela Lengwin of Linn-Mar finished seventh and eighth at the state diving meet at the Marshalltown YMCA Friday night.

Jacintha Thomas of Iowa City West won the championship with 561.10 points.

Deuso finished seventh with 448.10 points. Lengwin placed right behind her teammate with 444.15 points.

Carolyn Simon of Kennedy finished 16th with 387.30 points. Jayden Lovell of Kennedy placed 17th with 278.45 points.

Georgia Sanderson of Linn-Mar was 21st, Courtney Fisher of Kennedy 22nd and Amara Taylor of Washington 30th.

The state swim meet will be held in Marshalltown Saturday.

Cougars win title; Drake sets record

Not even a state-record performance from Linn-Mar's Kelsey Drake could overshadow a dominant team effort from Cedar Rapids Kennedy.

Drake, the Lions' super sophomore, set an all-time Iowa best in winning the 100-yard butterfly in Saturday's district meet at the Linn-Mar Aquatics Center. While Drake was the individual star, Kennedy was the team turning in good swim after good swim.

For one of the few times this season, veteran Cougars Coach John Ross was able to look on the deck and see his team at full strength. They responded by winning five events and had at least three top-six finishers in four events to take the team title.

Kennedy finished with 485 points to outdistance Metro rivals Linn-Mar (430) and Cedar Rapids Washington (307). All champions from the six districts around the state along with the next-best 18 finishers qualified for the state meet next Saturday at the Marshalltown YMCA.

"I can't tell you how happy I am with the way we swam today," Ross said. "This is what swimming is about to me. We swam as a team and we had so many people swim so well today.

"We have battled health issues all season," he continued. "This was the meet for us this year. Winning this was our goal."

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No. 9 Cougars rally to oust Lions, 3-2

The Kennedy Cougars lost the first two games against Linn-Mar Thursday night and trailed 22-18 in the third set when Coach Michelle Goodall called a timeout with her team on the verge of being eliminated from the Class 5A regional volleyball tournament.

She must have said the magic words.

The ninth-ranked Cougars rallied for a dramatic 23-25, 26-28, 25-23, 25-23, 15-12 victory in the regional semifinals at Linn-Mar.

Kennedy (28-9) will face third-ranked Dowling in the regional finals at Newton Tuesday night, with the winner claiming a spot in the state tournament at the U.S. Cellular Center in downtown Cedar Rapids.

Goodall challenged her players during that timeout with the Cougars just three points away from extinction.

"I told them in that timeout, 'Who believes we're going to win the next three points?,'" she said. "Three or four of them said, 'Yeah, we're gonna.'"

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