The Brookfield girls swimming and diving team has been dealing with life without any divers. The Lady Bobcats have one of the strongest swim teams in the SWC but they are faced with at times a double-digit point deficit before they even enter the pool.
Using quite a bit of strategy while leaning heavily on their talent, the girls have managed to begin the season with a 3-2 record. On Tuesday, their hard work paid off big time as they came away with the biggest win of the season, edging the Lady Rebels at New Fairfield.
Brookfield staked itself to an eight-point lead through the first four events. That lead was wiped away by the Lady Rebels divers, putting the Lady Bobcats down 37-35. Over the course of the next six events Brookfield surged ahead, taking an 86-80 lead heading into the final 400 Freestyle Relay.
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Spreading their swimmers around over multiple teams, Brookfield took second place and third place, edging New Fairfield in thrilling fashion by .7 of a second to secure the win.
“If we don’t tap out ahead of them we lose,” Brookfield head coach Brandt Nigro said.
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Brookfield built its lead early on by getting a first place finishes out of Steph Ferrarie in the 200 Free Style, Maddy Smart in the 200 Individual Medley and Sam Palicz in the 50 Free Style.
After the diving was complete, Palicz got the team back on track with a first place finish in the 100 Butterfly. Anna Brown followed her with a first in the 100 Free Style and Ferrarie put the team back in front for good with a first in the 500 Free Style. Smart set the team up for the final relay with a first place finish in the 100 Breast Stroke.
“She is a very talented swimmer,” Nigro said of Smart, who qualified for the in the 100 Meter Free Style this summer. “But she didn’t get to where she is because of talent, she works hard. She’s getting up at 4:30 in the morning, driving to Wilton, doing a practice, getting straight As in school then going back to Wilton in the afternoon. She made Olympic Trials — I knew she could do that. Sky’s the limit.”
The win was one the team desperately wanted. Coming off their most successful season in school history, being faced with defeats has been difficult.
Earlier in the season they had suffered two bitter losses even though they had clearly out swam the opposition. First the team was faced with the reality that comes with having no diver, as they were defeated 92-91 against Weston. Then they took it on the chin against a young, up and coming Newtown team 94-84.
“It is tough because a huge chunk of our team which gave us that boost last year, all they know of high school swimming is going 10-1,” Nigro said of how his team his handling the early season adversity that comes with losses. “But their smart, they know they work hard and we see us out swimming the other teams. They are handling it well; we got them more focused on the end of the season this year than on winning meets. That’s going to be our time to shine.”
Smart, a junior, is the obvious team leader who will be leaned on heavily in big meets. But the freshman trio of a year ago, Ferrarie, Palicz and Brown are a year older and vastly improved.
“Steph Ferrarie is already doing times that are faster than she ever went last season,” Nigro said, adding that her mental toughness is taking her to another level. “Anna Brown could be one of the top girls in the Class M and SWC, same with Sam Palicz.”
The trio’s versatility and endurance have proven valuable already, not only in the win over New Fairfield where they were also parts of the relay teams as well as their individual races, but also in the two wins over Stratford and Bunnell.
The team is off until Tuesday when they will face Joel Barlow in a meet to be held at Western Connecticut State University.
