Aquianas Win Number 8 

The New Canaan YMCA Aquianas successfully defended their East Zone Senior Synchronized Swimming Championship team title for the eighth consecutive year. The competition, held in Fairless Hills, PA March 7-9^th, had the Aquianas up against 19 teams from all across the Northeast. The Aquianas won all of the events but needed their strong compulsory figure scores in order to secure the overall team win.

In the all-important compulsory figure event, New Canaan swept the top five spots.  Gold went to Madison Crocker, silver to Colleen Courtmanche, bronze to Megan Hansley. Kelsey Smith and Casey Aion rounded out New Canaan’s top 5 in this phase of the competition. “It isn’t the most exciting part of the competition, but we know that our team is strong in this event, so we are confident that we can do well,” said Hansley.

The Aquianas continued with gold and silver wins in the trio event. Having won the gold the previous year, Courtmanche, Crocker and Hansley were favored to win again and did not disappoint.  They won with a score of 76.532. Less expected was the silver, which was won by the newly-formed trio of Aion, Marina Hoffman, and Smith.  Their score of 73.763 put them in second place, narrowly ahead of the trio from the Tonawanda Aquettes (Jessica Grogan, Jessica Bagley and Trish Melber) who took the bronze (73.717).  The New Canaan trio of Gordon, McLachlin, and Shah placed 14^th.

Crocker and Hansley captured the gold in the duet competition (76.696).  “We were thrilled to move up to the gold this year after taking the silver in 2007 at this meet,” said Megan Hansley, a junior at New Canaan High School.  Silver went to fellow Aquianas Aion and Smith, with a score of 75.145.  “We were happy that we had a great swim. We are new swimming together (Smith won last year with her sister Corinne) so placing second gives us a lot of confidence going into the next meet,” said Smith. Tonawanda’s Bagley and Melber took the bronze in this event, with a score of 73.706.  New Canaan’s Dana McLachlin and Mina Shah placed 14th in the duet competition.

Courtmanche continued the Aquianas’ dominance by winning the solo competition, with a score of 75.619, beating Tonawanda’s Jessica Grogan. Courtmanche placed first out of the top 20 solos from across the region. “It was nice to be crowned solo champion this year, as I had only placed 5^th last year and 6^th the year before that.  This was a huge jump for me and I am thrilled. This performance gives me a lot of confidence heading into Junior Nationals and Junior National Team trials next month,” said Colleen Courtmanche, a junior at Hamden High School. Hoffman finished 7^th in solos (72.499), which was a surprise finish for the swimmer.  “I haven’t had a solo routine since 2005 so I was a bit nervous swimming one again this year.  Since my duet partner left the team at the end of last season, I decided to try it. I really wanted to make finals but wasn’t really expecting to,” said Marina Hoffman, a freshman at New Canaan High School.  New Canaan’s Rebecca Gordon placed 9^th in the solo event.

New Canaan was in second place in the team competition after the semifinals, marginally trailing the Tonawanda Aquettes. The team of Aion, Courtmanche, Crocker, Gordon, Hansley, Hoffman, McLachlin and Smith needed their compulsory figure scores to put them ahead going into finals (50% routine score plus 50% figures scores). “We were only ahead of Tonawanda by .85 after they added in our figures,” said Coach Mahoney. “We knew we had to swim well. You never know what the judges are going to do scorewise. The girls really fought for everything in their routine. I just knew they were going to pull out the win.”  The final score for New Canaan was 75.721 to Tonawanda’s 74.288, a spread of 1.43.  The Capital District Sculpins were third.

The second squad from the Aquianas gained valuable experience at this highly contested meet.  The team of Abby Butcher, Laura Cardi, Amelia Clark, Alison Commender, Amanda McKenzie, Ankita Mukherjee, Jennifer O’Neill, and Mina Shah competed for their first time at this Senior Zone Meet and placed 11^th overall. “They are a young team, and the more competitive experience they can gain the stronger they will be,” said coach Jen Muzyk.

Next up for the Aquianas are the US Junior Championships and Junior Trials in Clermont, Florida from April 8^th-13th. For more information about the Aquianas, please contact Sandra Mahoney at (203) 966-4528, ext 153.