Metros could be moving earlier in the swim calendar to accomodate the inclusion of Montgomery County Public Schools in the Maryland state meet (Doug Kapustin/For The Washington Post).
For the past five years, Maryland has crowned its state swimming champions at the Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association championship meet at the conclusion of each season. But to this point, that field of competitors has never included a large contingent of schools that boast some of the fastest swimmers in the state: Montgomery County Public Schools.
Long before the MPSSAA founded its state meet in 2007, MCPS was concluding its swim season with the Washington Metropolitan Interscholastic Swimming and Diving Championships, annually one of the top regional high school swim meets in the country. Every year Montgomery’s swim and dive coaches vote to continue their participation in Metros – which also includes many of the areas top private schools – rather than join the rest of Maryland’s public high schools at the state meets, which fall on the same weekend.
But in the wake of yet another slew of record-shattering performances and intense competition at Metros, those coaches are considering a proposal to add the Maryland state meet to their schedule while moving Metros two weeks earlier. The impact of such a shift on both meets could be staggering.
As one Montgomery County coach suggested “the regional times and state meet records will be re-written” if MCPS show up at the Maryland state meet next year. And a comparison of this year’s times at both meets proves that would all but assuredly be the case. With the exception of the girls’ 50 and 100 free – marks held by former Severna Park All-Met Emily Lloyd – the winning times at Metros 2011 would have set Maryland state records in every event. Of those 20 events, MCPS swimmers posted times that would have set records in 15, many by a wide margin.
Walter Johnson junior Garrett Powell and senior Elizabeth Pepper swept the 500 free at Metros in times of 4:29.12 and 4:48.84, respectively, which would have crushed the Maryland state records in those events: 4:43.13 and 5:08.06. In the boys’ 400 free relay at the Maryland 4A/3A meet, Severna Park’s record-setting time of 3:23.23 would have been good for 14th place at Metros.
“If Montgomery County joined the state meet, I think the level of competition would go up tenfold,” Eleanor Roosevelt coach and Kennedy graduate Anne Koroknay said. “Bringing in powerhouses with that level of skill and tradition would force everyone else to really step up.”
But while there’s little dispute that adding Montgomery County’s teams to the mix at the state meets would lead to faster times, moving Metros earlier in the calendar – and thus eliminating swimmers’ taper period before the meet – could dilute the overall speed of the competition. Koroknay also wondered if the shift would enable Prince George’s County teams – who competed at Metros prior to the inaugural state meet in 2007 – to rejoin that meet and continue to compete at states.
“Metros is the meet of the season,” she said. “I’d love to get some of my kids into that meet to be in front of scouts and experience that type of atmosphere. Will that door be re-opened to us?”
With the MPSSAA championships scheduled for Feb. 25 next winter, Metros would need to be moved up two weeks – to Feb. 8-11. This would allow Montgomery County schools to participate in regional meets – a requirement for state meet participants and the lone opportunity for swimmers to qualify for the state meet – the weekend in between, Feb. 18. (Currently MCPS swimmers can qualify for Metros by meeting time standards at any point during the season, not just in championship meets).
The scheduling change would also necessitate the elimination of two meets from the MCPS schedule, which would likely include two of following: the annual relay carnival in January, divisionals and the Montgomery County championships. Should the proposal gain approval, the relay carnival appears most likely to go, but coaches are conflicted over the choice between divisionals and the county meet. The former allows for far more participation from swimmers and more balanced competition based on a team’s level of talent while the later separates the top swimmers in individual events and generally favors swimmers from the top divisions.
“It seems that the MCPS athletic directors are very much into the idea of doing the state meet,” Blake assistant athletic director and head swim and dive coach Jared Fribush said. “Unless the coaches provide some reasons not to do both Metros and states, I could see this happening as soon as next season.”
The greater concern for some is the effect the scheduling change would have on the times at Metros.
“I think it would tarnish it somewhat,” longtime Wootton coach Howard Blume said. “Metros is a different animal. Our thing is so unique where you have kids competing against the best of the best. It’s non-sectarian – you’ve got publics and privates and Catholic schools – and it crosses boundaries that you just don’t see anywhere else.”
“The emphasis has always been on that meet – even from the club teams, which are our lifeline. But if you move the meet, there’s just no way it will be the same.”
Another issue is diving, which is part of the team competition at MCPS divisionals, the county championship and Metros but is not included in the scoring of the Maryland state meets. The MPSSAA is considering changing its diving competition from an exhibition to a scoring event, but that would only be to determine an individual champion and would not factor into a school’s overall point total – thus eliminating the impact of divers on a team’s title contention.
No decision has been made at this point as athletic directors discuss the possibilities with each other and their swim coaches, but a verdict must be in by August when athletic schedules are set for the 2011-12 school year. And Fribush believes change is on the way, possibly within the next few months.
“From an athletic director’s point of view, they’d like to have all the sports aligned in terms of regional and state championships,” Fribush said. “Right now swimming and boys’ volleyball are the only sports that don’t use that structure.”
“Most of the coaches in the county have grown accustomed to Metros – I swam in it, and it’s a great meet. The competition there and the atmosphere that it provides, I don’t think that it will be easy to replace that with states. But over time, just like the Virginia state meet, our state meet will become very important to the teams competing in it.”
Tags: Maryland High School Swimming, Montgomery County High School Swimming
omg no more relay carnival?
FINALLY!!!!!!!!! This is great News!! Wow I love exclamation points!!!!!!!!!!!!!
How about they take away one of our exhibition meets instead of getting rid of divisonals? I mean, we have two exhibition meets, one at the beginning of the season and one at the end of the duel meet season.
As a supporter of MC High School swimming, MCSL Summer League swimming, RMSC and PVS, I am not convinced that this proposed change will benefit Montgomery County or the scores of high school “only” swimmers from Montgomery County. Most of these swimmers do not qualify for Metros, because you need to be fast to qualify and you need to swim year round to do that, not the 2 days a week for 1 hour at a time allotted for our high school swimmers. The proposal indicates that they would need to eliminate 2 meets. 2 of the 3 proposed if selected would prevent a high school only swimmer from competing. Do we need to do this? Not all teams are blessed with abundance of swimmers and I see this as a potential issue for recruiting for smaller teams. Additionally,
How do you qualify for the State meet, and what are the regions? Do they only take the top 2 Regional finalist from each event? It seems like we will have Metro qualified swimmers who would not qualify for the State meet because of this selection process. Was this envisioned by the Athletic Directors and Coaches from Montgomery County? How does this benefit the student athlete who doesn’t swim year round? What is the point of making this change?
@suggestion – We cannot eliminate the exhibition meet, because it is less than 21 days after the first practice. No team can have an official contest within 21 days of the November 15th start of practice (state rule for all sports). There is only one exhibition meet – the final dual meet of the season is an official meet, just out of division.
@Concerned Supporter – Regions are determined by school size and location. More than likely, all of the MCPS 4A/3A schools would form their own region. The smallest 3A schools would be with the 2A/1A schools, and most likely would compete in a region with schools from other counties. In the Region meets, each team would be allowed to enter two swimmers per event, regardless of times (and one relay team). This is the same as our current County Championship entry limits, which is why Counties is viewed as a logical meet to eliminate. Additionally, the new Region meet (for the 4A/3A schools) would be pretty much the same as the current County Championship, minus the smallest schools in the County. As far as qualifying for States, the current format has the top four finishers from each Region meet automatically qualifying. After that, the next 12 fastest finishers that were not automatic qualifiers were added to States as wild card entries, regardless of their Region. If MCPS does compete, I would imagine the number of wild card qualifiers would change, since there would be additional four automatic qualifiers. Also, the reasoning for eliminating the Relay meet is that it does not count in the standings already.
Right now the kids love Metros. It is the one high school meet they look forward to all season. It is something special to the kids. It is also something special to the rest of the country since it is widely recognized as one of the fastest high school meets in the country. Right now this meet is 3 weeks before JR Nationals, so it is possible for the taper for metros and the taper for JR Nationals to co-exist. If this meet is moved earlier in the season then the top swimmers will swim this meet un-tapered. It will no longer be one of the fastest meet in the country and it will no longer be special. And people who know absolutely nothing about swimming are the people making the decision to ruin this great event.
If MCPS decide to go with the proposed changes, the MD State meet will be a practice meet for the METRO’s swim meet. On a good note for MCSP, pretty much all records for the MD State will be broken and held by MCPS swimmers (too bad the change didn’t happen this year as there were many fast races at METROs) . It might make more sense to get all counties in the state of MD to include swimming as a high school sport before pushing forward on the All State Meet. (currently, swimming is not included as a high school sport in Howard County)
I agree with SwimDad
I noticed the posting date. Is this an April Fools joke? Or is this for real?
@ Question – I was thinking the same thing!!
It might be a good thing for Maryland high school swimmers since the year-round swimmers in Baltimore (North Baltimore, Navy Swimming, etc.) would probably participate in high school swimming to compete against their counterparts from Potomac Valley. If not, it is always good to see all counties participate in a state championship. Swimmers just need to be open-minded and listen to all and not just a few who want to stir things up. Remember when “Life gives you lemon, make lemonade”.
I can honestly say the only reason I swim for MCPS is because of Metro’s. I do not like anything else about it.
it’s for real, quite unfortunately
As a high school swimmer, I can say that this would be horrible for all of us. Since it is only 4 swimmers from regionals at states, states would just wind up with 4 MCPS swimmers, then everyone else. Metros is a fun meet where everybody is trying hard and swimming fast. As a wise man once said, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
There is a lot of information posted on the Facebook page Save Metros including letters to Dr. Beattie, head of athletics for MCPS and responses from him. He claims that “With a few exceptions” all the high school coaches support this change. Not one that I have spoken with supports it Please feel free to join the group and sign the petition – link from the FB page.
If they truly care about the swimmers and want the opportunity for more athletes to compete in post season competition, which is one of the reasons he states, then leave the schedule the way it is – allow the Metros qualifiers to swim Metros and those who don’t can swim Regionals and States – my bet is MCPS will still come out on top. At the very least, spend next year attending both meets and decide after that.
States doesn’t have diving – although they have stated they will include it if MCPS comes. It is also a timed final meet – not much of a championship event. By the way – no noise makers and no excessive celebrations (ie coaches in the pool when results are announced) and athletes must stay in the team area. So it sounds like you’re not even at the end of the lanes cheering on your team mates. Oh and, by the way, for the swimmers who really care about Metros, unless PVS changes its policy, Metros would not be an observed meet – only the final two meets of the year are observed. So none of the times would count.
Another concern is going to be the dominance of MCPS – does anyone want to put a guess on a timeline until there is a fiasco at the state meet like they had in VA where one region decided to “interpret” the rules on their own.
As with so many other things in MCPS – it’s not about the students. Why would you take away Metros – it will surely die if this new format is adopted – to replace it with a junk meet like States? Just look at the conflicts that occurred in Virginia at their state meet this year to realize. They swim in SCM, no warm-up/cool down – somebody interpreting the rules who doesn’t know them to begin with, then not disseminating their “ruling” resulting in kids from Northern region being DQ’d. If you think Maryland is going to be any better than I have an ocean front property in Arizona I’d like to sell you.
HS Swim fan to be fair that was Virginia and not MD. MD has had theirs at UMD in SCY with a warm down pool every year save one and it was at PGSL. The rules have been deliniated and the officiating excellent the last 5 years. We can’t knock the meet managment if we have not seen it and how it is run.
in response to “Question” I have seen it and I know kids who have swum and won – but you can not tell me that a timed finals event is a “Championship” meet. Great – they paid for a venue – and PG is not the greatest venue – last time I was there the scoreboard didn’t work. But just look at the times – and look at the US Swimming times of the kids who won – they did not win with best times. It is a slow meet. Why would you ruin something great to replace it with something mediocre? Make the State meet a true championship meet – prelims and finals, include diving, fast pool – then allow the swimmers and coaches to choose – my bet is not a single one would go to the state meet – even if it meant coming in 40th at Metros – that is a much larger accomplishment than swimming against a 1:00 100 freestyler (who came in 5th – yay.)
And I know the difference between VA and MD. But it won’t be long before some other region decides that MCPS is too good, too powerful, too . . . . and then they will pull a stunt like what happened in VA this year.
hs swim fan-amen brother
It’s not just the fact that MD States is slower, the vibe at Metro’s can’t even compare to mostly all PVS or other club meets. All swimmers love to have their “private school friends” with them at big meets like this. It would be so unfortunate to not be able to swim at Metro’s anymore.
Anybody notice that more than half of the individual events and all but 2 of the relays were won by private school kids? They will not be in the water at a “State” meet. What about all the kids who are currently “state champs” who won’t even make an A final if you include the MCPS swimmers. Why ruin a great meet over a title? I would bet if you asked this year’s winners would they rather be Maryland State Champ or Metro’s Champ the majority would take the Metro’s crown. College coaches know the difference too. This is just an all around bad idea.
So those of you who care – write to Beattie – he is the head of athletics for MCPS – oh and also happens to be president of MPSSAA – the group that runs the state meet. Write to your athletic directors if you are in MoCo, write to your principals – they are actually the representative to MPSSAA – get involved. This is a horrible idea made by people who don’t care about the athletes or our sport.
I can’t believe PG county ran away from Metros to participate in a state meet without Montgomery County in the first place. Additionally, any state meet that doesn’t invite the state’s private schools is hollow in my opinion. So while I could understand MCPS wanting to show the rest of the state who’s boss – leaving GC, Prep, and DeMatha out of the mix means it’s still less than a true state championship.
If anything, everyone should be working to bring the NoVa public schools into Metros as well. Having them there would obviously make Metros even better. I know they’ve never been there – but I’ve always wished they could be. Maybe one benefit of shifting the calendar might be to enable this.
They are proposing to participate in the State Champs in addition to Metros. The Metros will not likely to be repalced by the State Champs.
As a former MCPS swimmer who competed at Metros all four years, I am have very strong feelings and attachments to this meet. After graduating, I still follow this great meet and talented student athletes. With as much love for this meet, I think everyone should not be so attached to Metros. Yes, it is a fantastic meet and a lifelong memory that is to be cherished. But as a former MCPS swim and dive champion that was in contention at Metros, I hated the fact that I could never be a “State Champion” If we were to switch to a state championship, there would have to be certain requirements that I feel would have to be met to keep the same atmosphere that Metros has in order for it to be a success. 1) I think it has to be at a very fast pool like UMD 2) The cut times must be faster in order to make it more competitive to make; Metros is too easy to qualify for and thus brings down its prestige. If you look at other states meets like Pennsylvania, Texas, or Ohio, they have excellent championship meets that are just as fast, if not faster and much deeper than Metros is. And also, Metros doesn’t even do podiums anymore. I remember going to Metros in 8th grade and my dream was to be on the podium when it was at MAC. But now they don’t do it. At least bring that back.
So those of you who care – write to Beattie – he is the head of athletics for MCPS – oh and also happens to be president of MPSSAA – the group that runs the state meet. Write to your athletic directors if you are in MoCo, write to your principals – they are actually the representative to MPSSAA – get involved. This is a horrible idea made by people who don’t care about the athletes or our sport. Suggest that he wait one more year, go to both meets, then try to find a way to make both meets happen and count – put Metros AFTER states as an “All-Star” meet, swim them in the same week so that Metros is on Thursday/Friday with States on Saturday – There are lots of possible ways to solve this without losing the best high school meet in the country!
Wow, all of us should thank the hard work of the people who make such a wonderful site for local swimming community.
So those of you who care – write to the head of athletics for MCPS – who also happens to be president of MPSSAA – the group that runs the state meet. Write to your athletic directors if you are in MoCo, write to your principals – they are actually the representative to MPSSAA – get involved. This is a horrible idea made by people who don’t care about the athletes or understand our sport. Suggest that he wait one more year, go to both meets, then try to find a way to make both meets happen and count – put Metros AFTER states as an “All-Star” meet, swim them in the same week so that Metros is on Thursday/Friday with States on Saturday – There are lots of possible ways to solve this without losing the best high school meet in the country!
GC Alum
I can believe PG left…. They got made to fell awefully unconfortable attending the meet and unwanted as well. THis happened back when I was swimming in Metro’s in the 90′s when they introduced cuts for relay teams! At first they where not unreasonably fast then it got to the point when essentially most of them could not even send anyone. That is why a large chunck of them left to have their own seperate invitational along with the SMAC teams that got uninvited! The state meet came later!
Writing letters and speaking to the swimmers will not help in this situation. It will come down to what the athletic directors want. I am sure that there is some pressure from parents and other school jurisdictions to become part of the State Championship process. Athletic directors are about equality in their department. A similar situation occurred in Girls soccer in the late 90′s. Girls soccer in Montgomery County was played in the spring. It was actually quite competitive and games were well attended. The championship games had attendance of over 1,000 fans. Parents however put pressure on MCPS to have their kids play for a state championship. Therefore it changed to the fall in 1998. The change is not a given one way or another. The athletic directors will talk to their coaches. But ultimately the final decision will be theirs.
Keep in mind that MPSSAA stands for MD PUBLIC Secondary Schools Athletic Association so no, private schools should not and could not be included. Also, one commenter said that it would be great if teams like NBAC could send their Baltimore County swimmers. As much as all of these people complain about all of this stuff in Mont Co., keep in mind that Baltimore Co. has no high school swimming at all (separate from City schools). I say we give it a try. If it is so easy as everyone says, we don’t need to even be tapered for this meet. Metros can still be the big meet and States a walk in the park…. as everyone is saying. I think the school gets money for placing at states as well.
There are some great reasons both FOR and AGAINST the proposal. But in the end, we have to remember that we are in a unique area for swimming – multiple major scholastic/athletic bodies (dc, moco, pg, private schools, arlington, fairfax…) all within a few miles of each other. Conflicts like this were and are inevitable. However, this is a great opportunity for Metros and States to coexist and even thrive off each others success.
I would love to see additional innovative efforts being put into the derivation of the swimmers who end up on the blocks at the State meet. There has to be a way that can include times not achieved at this Regional meet (read: include times from County Championship meets and Metros in qualifying for states). Swimming is a unique sport – and there is no reason why we can’t have a slightly different process than other sports. This would help Metros athletes avoid adding another “big” meet to the schedule. One thing that many club coaches (and many swimmers too) dislike about the high school schedule is the number of meets. The amount of racing takes its toll on the athletes, and they are often at odds with both their HS coaches AND their club coaches about which meets are important. By adding a 4th “big” meet into the mix (for MoCo: Divisionals or Counties/Metros/Regionals/States) – and likely all on back to back weekends. Ouch.
Sure, that idea hurts Regionals, but come on, this is a time-based sport. Maybe make Regionals an optional last chance qualifier – or get rid of it all-together, which is really not a bad idea, as the kids could use a week off. Including these other times and either eliminating or making the Regional meet optional would also help follow PVS policy about observed meets, though I don’t see why they can’t change this to make the State Championship a separate beast.
In the end, I think that this discussion is great, but it is all happening too quickly. It would be great to get more input from all HS and club coaches and the parents who pay for all this and drive their kids all over MD for these meets. But don’t forget about the kids themselves. The kids at states want to swim against the faster kids at Metros; and I am sure many of Metros champions wouldn’t mind the title “State Champion.” This is for THEM, and I think their voices are being ignored. Think about it some more, and lets not make any decisions until the 2012-13 season.
Many of you who say metros is the best and fastest high school meet in the country obviously haven’t looked at state meets from other states. Take a look at the results from the PA, TX, CA, FL state high school meets. As far as regionals is concerned…if I remember correctly in order to qualify for the Olympics you have to place 1st or 2nd at Olympic Trials. Not everyone has a good race when teh pressure is on, but being on when it counts is a big part of our sport. Using times from earlier in the season would make it a glorified club meet, which is what metros is anyway.
Swimfan12 is just looking at the winning times – if you time out the top 16 or 20, Metros is faster than almost all of those other meets, because it is so deep.
There is an easy solution for all this:
(1) eliminate the MCPS scrimmage/exhibition meet
(2) eliminate relay carnival
(3) keep Divisionals
(4) turn Counties into Regionals
(5) make the MD State meet the weekend after Regionals
(6) make Metros AFTER the MD State meet, and 1 week later than now
(7) Junior Nationals comes after Metros
Making Metros closer to Jrs would actually improve the taper situation (3 weeks is too long to be tapered for most kids).
According to state rules you cannot compete after the state meet. That has to be the last, final, biggest meet of the year. It is the same for other sports. The kids who are worried about juniors can attend a club meet the weekend after. A lot of the kids actually try to qualify in events that are not part of the high school meet program…so everyone is happy.
The reason the top 16-20 is faster at metros is because almost every club kid makes the meet. In the other states I mention, PA in particular, the process of getting to states is more selective and requires placing in certain positions at a qualifying meet. There are kids who would place in teh 16-20 at metros that are watching from the stands.