2017 CIF State Championships
- Friday, May 19th-Saturday, May 20th
- Clovis Olympic Swim Complex (Clovis, California)
- 25-Yard Course
- Psych Sheet
- Meet Info
- Live Results
Top seed Nate Biondi, a senior representing Sierra Canyon, was missing in action during Friday’s preliminaries of the 2017 CIF State Championships. Biondi, who gave his verbal commitment to swim for California next fall, was the top seed in the 50 free at the state meet.
Another big name missing from the meet this season is Crean Lutheran’s Eva Merrell, who competes for the USA National Team. Unlike Biondi, however, Merrell wasn’t entered on the psych sheet for the meet. Had she been at the meet, Merrell would’ve been a title favorite in the 100 fly and 100 back.
Biondi and Merrell aren’t the only top contenders who decided to skip out on the state meet. Because the state meet falls in late may and high-level swimmers want to shift their focus to long course, much of the top talent isn’t in attendance. For example, the top 5 swimmers in the women’s 200 free from the combined CIF-Southern Section division meets (Santa Margarita’s Ella Ristic and Samantha Shelton, Sonora’s Taylor Ault, JSerra’s Katie Glavinovich, and Woodbridge’s Kate Krolikowski) opted out of the state meet this year.
The only way for the California State Meet to grow is for CIF to go “all in” on every sport and have legitimate State Championships. This would de-emphasize the section championships which are mostly all people care about anyway. But….this will never happen. I don’t necessarily think it’s too big (look at Texas, after all) but each section has their own historical traditions which make it difficult. To educate, there are 10 “state championships” in California sports: Southern Section (Orange, Riverside, LA, San Bernardino, Santa Barbara and Ventura counties), LA City (LAUSD schools), San Diego, Central (The Valley), Central Coast, San Francisco City, Oakland City, North Coast, San Joaquin (Sacramento Area) and Northern. Keep in mind, there are over 30… Read more »
Agree 100% – Its not about LC swimming. There is no emphasis on the state meet.
I got sick
Sorry you were sick. Hope you are feeling better. Congratulations on a great season and good luck as you move on to college.
Put this Californian high school swimming season from September to November!
Bobo, if that happened, high school teams would only be composed of club members.
Why?
Doesn’t it get too dark / cold to host meets outdoors in Oct/Nov? [from midwest and assuming no highschool swims inside ever… ]
It doesn’t start getting cold in most places until mid to late November. Would be much more ideal than rain in Feb, Mar, and Apr
I am having a hard time understanding this. Why do these kids even swim for their high schools if they are not going to stay until the last meet of the year?
Agreed. Should at least go to swim relays for his school, unless he was really at graduation
Can we have some news on the kids that did go?
Well there are full recaps on the kids that did go that were posted before this article…
He missed because he attended his high school graduation.
Then he should not have entered the meet in the first place. By entering, he prevented other swimmers from being invited to the meet.
This is why high school swimming is a fall or winter sport in many other states
You have water polo. Maybe, boys and girls water polo should be all fall and winter instead of girls water polo just before the swimming season. Also, lots of kids that barely made the national cut skipped as well its just too much for some kids to do another big high school meet.
They need to fix the league/sectional/state schedule and the way swimmers qualify or it will never change. Top 50 swims of the season should get in and they should update the times each Monday. It should also be 2 weeks after sectionals. Girls prelims Thursday / Boys prelims Friday / Finals Saturday.
I don’t think pushing the meet back a week would help boost attendance numbers considering the reason most people opt out of the meet is because they are done with HS swimming and wanting to shift focus to long course.
Thats partially true (maybe 30%) but not the main reason. I coach one of the better boys HS teams in California and the reason the kids opt out of states is CIF has given no reason for the swimmers to care about the “state” meet after sectionals. The kids get fired up for leagues (especially in OC) and sectionals and then they’re done mentally. Especially in SS D1 where the meet is very fast and hard to qualify for without resting some. Couple of ideas – move sections to the 1st weekend in May OR another would be to drop sectionals all together and go from leagues to states – top 50 times. States can still be in mid May… Read more »