Kearns girls win; boys 3rd

Kearns High hopes to remain near the top of the prep swimming landscape

during this weekend's 5A state championships.

Accordingly, it used last week's Region 3 championships as a tune-up for the big meet. And in that regard, the Cougars did well. For the second straight year, they won the region title comfortably on the girls side, beating out Hunter, 353 to 210.

Kearns' boys team finished third behind West Jordan and Bingham. "My goals (for region) were to have my kids go right around their best time," said Kearns coach Chris Horne. "If they're real close to their best time, that's a really good sign that with a week-and-a-half more rest that they're going to drop a whole bunch (of time at state). That's kind of what we saw, I thought."

The 5A state meet will be held this weekend at BYU, beginning with the first eight events tonight at 5 p.m.

Interestingly, Kearns took first place in all 11 events on the girls side at region.

"I don't think we planned it that way," said senior Natalie Edge, 'but that's awesome."

Horne said he was most pleased about the fact that his squad captured all three relays.

"To be able to sweep the relays, that's really hard to do," he said.

"You've got to have a lot of swimmers to do that. So I'm really happy about that."

As usual, Edge, a University of Utah signee, led the way at region. She won both her signature events, the 50-yard free and 100 free. She's the defending state champ in both events.

However, it wasn't just Edge. Stephanie Fredsall (200 IM and 100 breast) and Megan Raby (200 free and 500 free) also won two individual events, and Annika Bergesen (100 fly) and Adelin Marsh (100 back) chipped in with victories.

In particular, Fredsall looked solid at the region championships.

"Stephanie's 200 IM was just awesome," said Horne. "I was a little worried, but then her breaststroke leg was about two seconds faster than what she's been going. She really lit it up on the breast, and her freestyle leg was awesome, too.

"Hopefully we can put all four strokes together (at state). And she'll drop even more, I think."

That's what all of Kearns' swimmers will be aiming to do this weekend.