The Milan News-Leader
A Heritage Newspaper
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State seniors want to leave on high note
'Last chance' to impress at state an important one
By Jerry Hinnen, Staff Writer
PUBLISHED: March 6, 2008
To a man, the four seniors on the Milan state swim team say that having simply qualified for the meet isn't enough — not when it's their final time into the pool as Big Red swimmers.
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"It's our last season, our last chance," said 200-yard freestyle relay team member Matt Smith last week. "It's the last opportunity for most of us to swim competitively. You have to take advantage of that."
Smith and his teammates Ian Pendleton, Justin Beaudrie, and Zach Olson each agreed that taking advantage means not just swimming to the Big Reds' seed or ranking at the state meet (held Friday and Saturday at the Holland Aquatics Center in Holland), but swimming to the absolute best of their capabilities.
"We want to bring things back to where they were in 2000," Pendleton said. "We want to overachieve, to go beyond the expectations."
"We were happy to get 10th last year," Beaudrie said, "but this year we want to do better than that."
Achieving that goal might carry especial importance for Beaudrie and Olson, who joined the program only last season after transferring to Milan and will be making their first state appearances for the Big Reds.
"It means a lot," Olson said, "since this is my first year going to state and my last."
The immediacy and importance of the moment might hypothetically cause a case of nerves or jitters, but the four seniors each said that the pressure of the situation wasn't something they worried about.
"There's always pressure," Beaudrie said, "but we're used to it by now."
"We work too hard," Olson said. "We've already done the work, so I don't think there's that much pressure. We just have to go out and swim."
Pendleton agreed, saying that the Big Reds didn't have to worry about anything other than their own swims.
"You race as fast as you can," he said, "and whatever comes out of it, that's it."
What should come out of it if Milan does indeed swim their, the seniors agreed, was the top-10 or better finish they're looking for and a further cementing of the program's reputation as one of the state's strongest Division 3 programs.
"We're going to prove to everyone," Smith said, "what we can do."
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