LOHS, SHS coaches in joint effort to build up aquatics
programs
MORGAN HILL — Mack Haines and Lynn Gautschi face the same storyline each year.
Since the opening of Sobrato High School in 2003, few teams at Live Oak High School have had to take as large of a step back in numbers as their jointly headed swimming and water polo programs. The Acorns still produce team and individual success but to a lesser extent than in the pre-SHS era, when Haines and Gautschi guided them to more than 50 league championships and two Central Coast Section titles; Haines with boys water polo in 1997, Gautschi with girls swimming in 1994.
Still, Haines has never sounded more optimistic about the future of prep aquatics in Morgan Hill. He has enough swimmers to field a junior varsity boys squad, and Gautschi’s girls feature a blossoming crop of underclassmen who are meshing well with the team’s accomplished veterans.
Across town, Sobrato is breaking in new water polo and swim coaches — who happened to play for Haines at Live Oak.
“I see kind of a turnaround in the works,” Haines said. “It looks like there’s going to be a cooperative effort to raise the level of competition in this city.”
Haines pondered that possibility a year ago when he encouraged David Letts, a Division I scholarship water polo player at UC-Santa Barbara, to pursue taking over the SHS teams that were left heading in the right direction by former coach Paul Harris.
Now, Letts is in charge, and his primary assistant is Kevin Paulsen, a Division I All America goalkeeper at Loyola Marymount and one of Letts’ teammates on the ’97 Live Oak team.
“I’ve been in the corporate world for a while, and Mack said I should get back into coaching,” Letts said Monday. “He’s been a great mentor to me over the years.”
Haines hasn’t bothered to give him coaching advice.
“Dave is a champion in and out of the pool; same with Kevin,” Haines said. “They’ve been part of great programs in high school and college and are going to do just fine.”
Their Bulldogs did fine enough to give Haines and the Live Oak boys a scare last Thursday during a nonleague dual meet at LOHS. Sobrato outscored the Acorns for the first time in swimming history, but a disqualification against the Bulldogs in one of the events left the score tied 84-84.
“So, they still haven’t beaten me,” Haines joked of his cross-town rival.
“It was really a great boys meet overall. We were hoping to see what kind of talent we’re going to have this year, and it turned out well.”
Cody Coleman, Danny Robinson, Saul Orona and freshman Ryan McCombs have a legitimate chance to represent Live Oak at the CCS championship meet in late May, Haines said. That foursome won the 200-yard freestyle relay in one minute, 38.55 seconds last Thursday with Robinson, a junior, adding personal-record times in his two individual events — 100-yard butterfly (1:02.61), 100-yard breaststroke (1:11.19) — and McCombs winning the 200-yard individual medley (2:14.95) and 100-yard backstroke (1:00.36). Orona, a sophomore, took first in the 100-yard freestyle (54.60).
Coleman, the team’s wily senior, and Robinson were part of a 200 freestyle relay that reached the CCS preliminaries a year ago.
“Danny has a shot at making it through prelims, and Ryan could certainly make the cut, too. His performance Thursday was very encouraging,” Haines said. “I think we’re going to be taking some other kids to CCS who haven’t been there before.”
The Lady Acorns are led by the usual suspects, seniors Katie Rick and Sarah D’Angelo, junior Rachel Cretcher and sophomore Michelle Mikaelsson. Those four will likely comprise one or two section-finals bound relays on top of qualifying in their individual disciplines.
Rick is set for CCS in the 100 freestyle and 100 breaststroke, which she won a Mount Hamilton Division title in last year, Cretcher will follow suit in the 200 and 500 freestyle and D’Angelo in the 100 backstroke and 50-yard freestyle. Mikaelsson, who is training with San Jose Aquatics, has already met a CCS-qualifying standard in the 100 butterfly. Teammate Marissa Sendejas could be a sleeper in the 200 IM.
“They’re in great shape right now. They’re on their way,” Gautschi said Monday. “Rachel is turning in good times right now; she looks fabulous. Sarah and Michelle have a good chance to do some special things this spring. Katie can make CCS in any event. I’m excited to see how far she goes.”
Letts is still formulating expectations, but his boys team should cruise to a second straight Santa Teresa Division championship and produce several section-qualifying standards along the way.
The Bulldogs’ short list of talent starts with the Thompson brothers, Danny and Timmy, and sophomores Adam Jasper and Patrick Read, who comprised three relay teams that swam in the CCS prelims last spring. Danny Thompson, a senior, could make a push in the 100 freestyle, which he won last year in the Santa Teresa championship meet, and classmate Paul Watts is close to meeting a section-qualifying standard in the 50 freestyle.
“It’s early, but the guys are working really hard, so my goals are high,” Letts said. “The guys have big expectations for themselves.”
The Sobrato girls team is a work in progress, having produced zero CCS swimmers in 2009. Christiana Bridges has already bucked that trend. The freshman has already qualified in the 500 freestyle and could be joined at sectionals by classmate Gabriel Smith (200 IM), sophomore Miranda Herrington (100 backstroke) and fellow freestylers Nika Burnett (500 yards) and Brittney Doutt (50).
Both local programs begin league duals this month. The Acorns will face Santa Teresa and Leigh at 3 p.m. today at LOHS, and Sobrato is scheduled to host Branham at the same time March 25.
