The state meets are two months away. But the swimmers on the Thornton Academy girls’ team are already talking about their chances.

They have been for a while, actually.

“That brewed last spring,” Coach Kathy Leahy said with a smile. “We talked about it at our banquet, we talked about it over the summer, we did a car wash in July and a fundraiser, and they’ve been all abuzz all along.”

And why not? This is a team that finished second by only six points last year, after third- and second-place finishes the two previous seasons. With talent on the roster and plenty of determination coming from those close finishes, there’s hope among the Golden Trojans that for the first time, this could be their year.

“I think it can,” sophomore Lucy Perry said. “Our team atmosphere is very close, we all give our everything everyday. There’s something about this team that’s very special, unlike any team I’ve ever been on.”

One Class A coach called Thornton “the team to beat.” If there’s any pressure that comes with that, the Thornton swimmers aren’t feeling it.

“It’s on their mind, but it’s a driving force,” said Leahy, in her 28th season at the helm. “It’s not a challenge to be fearful of.”

There’s no mistaking what the goal is this season, not after a finish last winter that has provided a lasting dose of motivation.

“I think everybody’s super excited this year,” sophomore Mackenzie Shields said. “We were all really proud of second. We all really worked hard and pushed ourselves in the meet. It just shows that we can continue to push ourselves.”

If the young swimmers had doubts about what they were capable of, last year’s result assuaged them.

“The fact that it was so close to first maybe made us realize how close we could be,” Perry said, “and that it’s possible in the future.”

The Trojans have a deep roster of 18 girls, and feature a pair of sophomores who will be two of the best swimmers in the state. Perry won the 100-yard breaststroke last year at 1:08.32, and she was second in the 200 individual medley (2:15.65) behind graduated Deering/Portland swimmer Maria DelMonte. Shields won the 200 and 500 free (1:59.40 and 5:16.70, respectively) and finished the year as the sixth fastest swimmer in the 100 free and seventh fastest in the 100 backstroke.

“They’re very good at handling their emotions well,” Leahy said. “The pressure is there, but they funnel it into their energy for their races, and they set a really good example for those that are new to it. That goes a long way. And you can’t teach that. They have it innately.”

The question is where the points will come from in addition to the two anchors, especially after Nora Freeman and Allie Lefebvre graduated after strong state meets. The Trojans are confident, however, that they have the depth to cover those losses. Anna Lefebvre scored in both the 100 butterfly and 200 free as a sophomore, and juniors Julianna Vallee and Jackie Scully, sophomores Stephanie Cote and Allie Garland and freshmen Stella Wells and Alyssa Jachimowicz have all impressed in early meets and practices.

“It won’t look the same,” Leahy said. “It may take two people scoring a little (better) to equal the points that a Nora could pull, or an Allie could pull. It might be two different swimmers when you add them together. … It’s who’s in that middle pack, that’s where that depth comes from.”

Even swimmers on the team who won’t factor into the scoring could help the ones who will. Thornton’s team includes swimmers from Wells, Biddeford and Noble, among them Biddeford senior Sara Harriman (second, 500 free) and Wells sophomores Carys Ramsey (fifth, 100 free) and Saoirse Carrigan (ninth, 100 butterfly). The team is not a co-op for scoring purposes, so they won’t factor toward Thornton’s point total, but Leahy said the competitiveness they bring to practice and meets is rubbing off on the other swimmers.

“That’s I think what they’re seeing, that’s getting them excited,” she said. “That has infected the whole team together. That’s where that hard work, determination and focus is coming from, is their support for each other. They’re teammates, through and through.”

Falmouth tied Thornton for second last year and brings back nearly its entire scoring team. Deering/Portland, the defending champion, lost DelMonte but returns a strong senior core with Kaia West, Anya Heiden, Sophia Harrod-Kim and Anica Spencer.

“We truly believe that our state championship title last year was because of the culture we built within our team, it wasn’t a few really good swimmers,” Deering/Portland Coach Sarah Rasmussen said. “We don’t feel like it’s a one-off.”

But if this finally ends up being Thornton’s turn?

“Oh, that’d be huge,” Leahy said. “They’d go ring the victory bell, and it would be very, very rewarding, for all of them.”