The Parkland girls won their seventh straight conference title when they downed Emmaus 104.5-81.5 last week. That's the bad news for the Lady Green Hornets. The good news is that things could be starting to turn for Emmaus, which has a number of strong, determined swimmers working their way up through the ranks.

Perhaps the emerging young swimmers best showing of the event came in the 50 freestyle. While it was senior Claire Frank who won the event, freshman Lexi Ruth battled Parkland's Alex Bodnar to tie for second in the event.

Meanwhile, junior Miranda O'Donald put on an impressive performance to finish just over a half-second behind Ruth and Bodnar. Putting three finishers in three of the top four spots gave Emmaus its first lead of the day, taking a 31.5-30.5 advantage over Parkland. Sophomore Marissa Decker, who swam in the exhibition lane, put up a time of 26.22 seconds in the event, which would have had her finishing fourth.

As the meet moved into the diving portion, freshman Jess Hurlburt won the event to preserve Emmaus' one-point advantage.

"My young kids on this girls team; so many young kids swam inspired and I really like seeing that," said Emmaus head coach Tim O'Connor. "They understand that this could be your last meet if you don't get your district qualifying times, so we prepared for that this week with Lexi Ruth, Marissa Decker and Brook Iobst."

Ruth and Decker qualified for districts in both the 50 and 100 freestyle events. Freshman Lydia Garton notched a first place finish in the 100 breaststroke and a third place finish in the 200 indivudual medley and is qualified for districts in each of those events.

"Lydia Garton getting first place in the breaststroke and a third in the IM, she swam really, really well," said O'Connor, who believes the meet against Parkland is the perfect opportunity for swimmers to step up. "We talk about our history of Parkland and Emmaus and the rivalry and the meet and I want these kids to understand that these are opportunities for them to swim fast.

"Those Parkland kids are going to give you everything, kicking and clawing, everything they can to try to beat you. If we don't respond with the same intensity, then that's not good and I don't want the kids coming up and saying 'that was just fun,'" O'Connor added. "With the intensity of this rivalry, if you can't generate the excitement to do well here, then you have to take a look at how you're approaching the sport."

O'Connor assembled what could turn out to be a strong 400 freestyle relay team for the future when he teamed Ruth, O'Donnell, Garton and junior Maura Beuttel. The team finished third in the event, behind another strong Emmaus team. The second-place team had senior Tori Bingham surrounded by juniors Casey Young and Samantha Mull and sophomore Kaitlin Hur.

O'Connor believes that some of the younger swimmers aren't only listening to the advice of him and the other coaches, but are attempting to follow in the footsteps of the upper classmen who are setting examples for young swimmers on how to compete.

"I always say 'you can't just swim fast, you have to throw your whole mind, body and soul into it,'" said O'Connor. "The emotion is so key, so it was nice to see that emotion from the young kids, because I think that's something that the team can build off as we go forward, not just next year, but as we go forward these next two weeks.

"It's always important to have those inspiring young kids who are loving every second of this and are chewing up everything you say. It was great to see that in a competitive meet like this, knowing that Parkland is going to bring its best and these kids dropped time and that speaks volumes of them."