Georgetown Prep’s run of IAC swimming dominance extends to a 23rd season

Max McMillan cradled the wooden base of the Interstate Athletic Conference swimming trophy beside the pool at St. Albans in Upper Northwest. The Georgetown Prep swim team, of which McMillan is a senior captain, had just extended the program’s streak of consecutive conference championships to nearly a quarter century.

“People just love to talk,” McMillan said. “Everyone says ‘We might get them this year,’ but we’ve shown for 23 years that we are the best in this conference. I don’t think that’s going to change.”

The Hoyas’ team score of 712 outpaced host St. Albans (641) with Landon (561) finishing third.

“You don’t want to be the kid that loses it,” McMillan said of Georgetown Prep’s lengthy streak. “The whole team recognized that we all needed to step up and do our part … We all came together, did our best and won the cup.”

“They were saying that it was getting closer by the year and that St. Albans would be giving us a run for our money, so there was a really big emphasis on doing our part and focusing on this meet,” freshman Griffin Oehler added.

Winning a championship requires more than just top-line talent. Georgetown Prep flexed its depth, winning all three relays. Hoyas Coach Matt Mongell also pointed to the 500-yard freestyle (won comfortably by junior Chase Donahue) and the 100 backstroke (which McMillan captured) as crucial.

“This year was definitely one of the closer meets and we really had to work from start to finish,” Mongell said. “… This year [our depth] showed a lot more because we had to rely a lot more on the middle kids than our superstars.”

The IAC and Mid-Atlantic Athletic Conference typically have a combined championship event on Georgetown Prep’s campus in North Bethesda, but a maintenance issue with a heat pump arose earlier in the week. St. Albans, the only other boys’ school in the league with a pool, stepped in, but the venue lacked the capacity to host both leagues.

The MAC had little choice but to cancel its event and crown a champion next weekend, with preliminary results from the Washington Metropolitan Prep School Swim Dive League championships — scheduled for Feb. 4 at the University of Maryland — to be used for the final standings.