One of the more intriguing high school swimming meets this Friday will involve Cheverus, Scarborough and McAuley.

Each school is notable both for the quality of its swim program and its lack of a pool.

Cheverus practices at the Portland YMCA and will host Friday’s meet. McAuley swims at the Boys and Girls Club. Scarborough? Well, depends on the day.

This winter season, Scarborough has practiced at five pools – three in Portland, one in Westbrook and one in Cape Elizabeth – often in a time slot that begins at 8 p.m. and ends at either 9 or 9:30.

“So we’re not home until 10 or 10:15, and that’s during the school week,” said first-year coach Eric French, who hastened to mention his gratitude for the communities that share their pool with his team.

On Tuesday night, French coached the varsity in Westbrook while assistant Maureen Baxter attended to the JV team at Reiche School. Throw in dry-land training that begins at 5:45 p.m. and “it’s almost like a full-time job for these kids,” he said.

 

EVEN WITH the challenges, the Scarborough program includes 62 athletes, of whom 17 already have achieved qualifying standards for the Class A state meet. The number was 18, but a promising freshman girl who qualified in three events had to drop out because the late nights were affecting her schoolwork.

One interesting addition to the Scarborough team is German exchange student Robert Kemmler, who easily qualified for the state meet in the butterfly (by four seconds) and breast stroke (by seven).

 

MCAULEY ALSO has a first-year head coach, Amy Regan, who was an assistant the previous three years. About 20 of her 30 girls began the season without a competitive swimming background.

“So we really had to start from the ground up,” she said, “but a lot of them have moved into the intermediate level.”

Regan said she hopes to bring at least 10 swimmers to the Class B state meet. Four of her top swimmers are seniors Aoife Ryle and Priya Ahluwalia and sophomores Taylor Church – who recently dropped nine seconds from her personal best in the 500-yard freestyle – and Libby Gajewski.

 

FALMOUTH JUNIOR Nicola Mancini, the defending Class B state champ in diving, broke 200 points in each of her first two six-dive meets. She also recently qualified for the AAU national championships in July in Riverside, Calif.

 

CAPE ELIZABETH junior Marcus Cloutier is unbeaten in four individual events this winter, the 50 and 100 freestyles, the 100 backstroke and the 200 individual medley.

The Donald Richards Pool has new touch pads so meets should run more smoothly, said Capers Coach Ben Raymond, who has something else to worry about.

Within the next week or so, the Richards Pool will take delivery of an inflatable play set that includes an obstacle course with a slide and will take up more than half the length of the 25-yard pool.

“To attract more families,” said Andrew Kemp, the Cape Elizabeth aquatics supervisor, who hails from Australia and ordered the $8,000 contraption from New Zealand.

Raymond’s team will test it out before the general public climbs aboard.

“So about that time things should go downhill,” Raymond said, “with the kids spending all the time on the play set and none of the time practicing.”

He was kidding – we think.

Check out the inflatable for yourself at aflextechnology.com by clicking on water products, obstacle course tube and magneetor.

 

Staff Writer Glenn Jordan can be contacted at 791-6425 or at: gjordan@pressherald.com