The St. Joe Varsity Swim and Dive dominated at the Metro Women’s Athletic Association in February 2023. The Angels brought home the hardware, with top placements in nearly every event and the team racking up a grand total of 501 points in their first place win. Not to mention the conference record-breaking performance of freshman Ellie Green, junior Cate Guenther, freshman Anna-Grace Guenther and junior Ava Wolf in the 200-yard Freestyle Relay, finishing with a time of 1:39.3. 

It was English teacher Ms. Emma Luem’s first season as head coach and she was absolutely delighted in the team’s impeccable performance at the conference meet. 

“This season, I am most proud of our conference win. It was the first since 2017, and we placed a conference record in the 200 Yard Free Relay. I loved my first year coaching at SJA, and I am excited to continue working with the team towards future conference championships,” she said. 

But it was in no way an easily earned triumph. The biggest challenge of the season of any high school swim is maintaining the team’s drive to compete amidst the first couple months of training. 

“We spent about two months practicing with little to no meets. It is easy to lose motivation and sight of goals. But everyone persisted and continued to work hard all the way through January and February, when we had most of our meets,” Coach Luem said.

An exciting aspect of the conference win was the team’s defeat of their on-going rival Cor Jesu. With many seasons of near-perfect win records, the Chargers have been the outlier with a consistent slight edge over the Angels. Even this season, the team defeated every single competitor in their dual meets except for Cor Jesu. Not only did this make its conference win even sweeter, but St. Joe took the lead by a whopping 47 points, ending the two teams’ streak of finishing with nearly matched scores.

The team’s success at the MWAA Conference meet is only one example of its formidable season. It finished with a win record of 6-1, and several Angels’ outstanding seasons earned them article recognition from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, with Ava being spotlighted for her impressive first season competing at St. Joe along with the achievements of the team as a whole. 

For the Missouri state championship prelims, 11 Angels qualified with a diverse number of both under and upperclassmen. The team once again had top finishers in every event with Angels entered, and ultimately went home as 5th place out of the 30 teams that competed. 

Anna-Grace competed in four events at state—200 yard freestyle (9th place), 100 yard freestyle (7th place), 200 yard freestyle relay (3rd place), and 400 yard freestyle relay (4th place)—kicking off a remarkable start to her high school swim career, already with achievements that many hope to graduate with. Anna-Grace was most excited by the team’s accomplishments, along with simply getting to know her fellow Angels.

“My favorite thing about this year was getting to know new people, along with setting a new conference record.” Anna-Grace said.

With team powerhouses like senior Sarah Donahue graduating, and soon after juniors Leah Renner and Ava Wolf, the future of the team looks towards underclassmen like Anna-Grace. Angels to watch for alongside her are freshmen Vienna Schindler, Ellie Green and Sophia Schmitt and sophomore Ella Cooper, all of whom had strong performances at the key meets of the season. 

Based on the astounding success of only one season with Coach Luem, and the strong Angels building the team on every level, the St. Joe swim and dive team is a threat to keep an eye out for.