ORANGE, Calif.— At East Los Angeles College in Monterey Park, Calif., SCIAC Championships take place each year. The meet proves to have it's high and low moments. People spend every last drop of energy cheering, coaching and swimming at the indoor meet where the smells of chlorine become the norm and being splashed by water is a given. 

On the second day of that competition, swim and dive saw moments that pulled at heart strings. James Galligan started off the evening recording a new school record and earning a B-Cut in the Men's 200 yard individual medley. The sophomore recorded a time of 1:52.11 to win his heat.

Senior free style sprinter Simon Jacobs then followed up that built up momentum on the high tops side. Jacobs placed third in the in 50 yard freestyle and cracked the podium with a blistering time of 20.41.

As he ripped off his goggles, the senior captain let out a roar splashing water droplets across the deck. His assistant coach, Jason Willman ran over to the excited podium finisher to bear hug him. When asked about his excitement, he later on said the 2023-24 SCIAC Champion is former Chapman swimmer Cole Kershner. In 2025, all podium times were faster than Kershner's 2024 title winning time. 

"It just proves how fast this event has become," Willman said. 

On the low tops' (women's) side, sprinting stars Kiana Tanizaki-Hudson, Alyssa Kooy, Tatum Chambers and Avery Hall finished fourth in the 200 yard freestyle relay with a time of 1:35.83. In similar fashion, all of those athletes also competed in the B-Cut Women's 50 yard freestyle. Tanizaki-Hudson and Kooy tied with a 24.04 swim. Chambers finished with a 24.24 just behind them. 

Ending off the evening, Jacobs, Riley Coleman, Trent Calloway and Max Polovinkin placed third in the 200 yard men's freestyle relay with a time of 1:21.41. With teammates cheering pool side, banging on the sides of diving boards and waving hands to help them swim faster, just five 100th of a second separated the podium finishers. The electic energy helped close out one of the most competitive races on day two. 

On the diving side, the high tops competed in the women's one meter competition. McKenzie Abbott and Gracie-Anne Fraunfelder placed seventh and eighth in the competition both finishing in the top 10. 

At the end of day two, the high tops ranked fourth with 200 points and the low tops ranked third with 211 points. Day three will include the men's three meter diving finals along with the men's and women's 100 yard butterfly, 400 yard IM, 200 yard freestyle, 100 yard breaststroke and100 yard backstroke.