Division 1-4 CIF Southern Section Champs Set For This Week In Santa Margarita

2021 CIF Southern Section Section Swimming & Diving Championships

• May 20 – May 27, 2021
• Santa Margarita Catholic High School
• Rancho Santa Margarita, California
• Short Course Yards
• Entries / Results Page

The 2021 CIF Southern Section Swimming Championships will take place this week in Rancho Santa Margarita, California. Both the men’s and women’s championships will be split up into 4 divisions. While the meet was canceled for the 2019-2020 season, the most recent version of the meets occurred back in 2019.

This will be a season-ending meet for most teams involved after CIF canceled the State Championship meet.

Diving competition was held last weekend.

Defending CIF Champions (2019)

Division 1 Preview

One of the biggest names to watch at the Division 1 women’s meet will be St. Margarita sophomore Justina Kozan is entered as top seed in the 200 freestyle (1:46.67), and 3th in 100 free (51.12). Kozan is known more as an IMer, having taken gold in the 200 IM at the 2019 World Junior Swimming Championships but will have a go at the sprint freestyles here.

Kozan raced in 2019 at the Division 3 CIF Championships and won the 200 IM with a 1:56.31 and the 100 fly in a 52.88. Kozan will be joining the University of Southern California women’s team beginning in the fall of 2022.

Izabella Adame will enter as top seed in both the 100 fly and 100 breaststroke, looking to improve upon her 4th place finish in the fly and second place finish in the breaststroke from back in 2019. Adame in her last year at Fountain Valley and has committed to swim at Arizona State beginning next fall. Another top seed in 2 events is Valencia freshman Joy Lee who holds the top seed in the 100 free with a 50.65 as well as the 50 free in which she holds a 23.28.

On the men’s side, Kyle Brill is the quickest entry in both the 100 backstroke and 200 IM, holding seed times of 48.22 and 1:48.18, respectively. During the 2019 version of the meet, Brill placed 12th in his sole, 100 backstroke, with a 58.23. Brill recently qualified for the Wave I Olympic Trials meet with a long course 100 backstroke of 56.58 swim at the St. George Sectionals in Utah.

Another name to watch will be Tesoro junior Anders Aistars who’s going in first in the 100 free with a 44.96 and second in the 200 with a 1:37.53. He’s entered right behind Loyola’s Rex Maurer in the 200 who holds a 1:37.09. Maurer will also race the 500 freestyle in which he is entered second with a 4:24.56 behind Matthew Chai‘s 4:23.39.

Division 2 Preview

St. Lucy senior Marly Lough will be racing in the Division 2 meet and holds 3rd seed in the 200 IM (2:04.76) and 4th seed in the 100 free (50.92). Lough is actually the defending champ in the 100, having posted a 50.11 back in 2019 as a sophomore. At that meet, Lough also placed 2nd in the 200 freestyle with a 1:49.28 to Casslyn Treydte‘s 1:47.19.

Top seed in the D2 women’s 200 IM will be Michelle Tekawy who is currently a senior at Corona del Mar and has committed to race for UC Santa Barbara beginning next season.

As for the boys, Notre Dame senior Evan Yoo holds 2 top seeds, entered in the 100 breaststroke with a 55.05 and the 200 IM with a 1:49.84. In his final year of high school, Yoo has committed to swim for Army West next fall.

Cruz Tester will head into the D2 championships with a leading spot in the sprint events. An El Toro junior, Tester is the fastest 50 freestyler with a 20.78 to Justin Schneider‘s 20.83 and has the only sub-46 100 freestyle with a 45.76 to Caden Noreen‘s 46.29.

Division 3 Preview

Grace Wharton is heading into the division 3 meet with a top seed in the 500 free and a third place seed in the 200 free. As a freshman at El Modena, Wharton is nearly 3 seconds quicker than second seed Morgan Kampfer and third seed Ayden Min who have entry times of 5:11.22 and 5:11.24, respectively.

Ike Harms is the quickest entrant in the men’s 50 and 100 freestyle at the division 3 meet, holding a 20.47 in the former and a 45.76 in the latter. Harms is a Canyon-Canyon high school junior and will join the University of Utah in the fall of 2022.

Rowland junior Eric Yeh will attempt to improve upon his 2019 results where he finished 7th in the 200 IM and 17th in the 100 butterfly. He’s entered to race the 100 back and 200 IM this year as top seed in both, holding a seed time of 51.63 and 1:52.61.

Division 4 Preview

The big name to watch on the girls’ side of the division 4 meet will be Hanna LaBrada. LaBrada sits atop the heat sheets in both the 100 butterfly and 200 IM as a freshman for California high school. In the butterfly, LaBrada is entered with a 59.17 which is more than 2 seconds ahead of Regine Valdez‘s 1:01.67 second place seed. In the 200 IM, LaBrada leads with a 2:14.74 which makes up nearly a 5-second margin ahead of Delaney Cowan‘s 2:19.62.

Also with 2 top seeds is Kathryn Simpson, a sophomore for Charter Oak. The sophomore will look to deliver double sprint gold for her school and will head into the 50 free with the only sub-25 seed of 24.72 and the 100 free with a 53.11 as the only sub-55 swimmer.

On the boys’ side, Tyler LeDet will be the name to watch in the sprint events as top seed in the 50 free and 100 backstroke. As a senior for River Springs, he ranks first in the 50 free with a 21.76 to Noah Gniffke‘s 22.81, and in the 100 backstroke, he holds a 50.78 which is almost 6 seconds faster than Daneel Polakoff‘s entry time of 56.54.

2 years ago LeDet raced to a 6th place finish in the 100 butterfly (53.64) and a 12th place finish in the 50 freestyle (22.49) at the division 4 CIF Championships.