Orange Coast Women Outlast Riverside in OEC Championships

The Orange Coast College Pirates captured the Orange Empire Conference championship on Saturday at OCC.  The Pirates out dueled Riverside City College and now head to the state championships as one of the favorites.

Orange Coast was a winner in nine different events.  Paige Woodside was the workhorse, winning three separate events.  Woodside won the 500 Freestyle in a time of 5:19.81 to outlast Riverside City's Anabella Storar, shaving nearly six seconds off of her prelim time.  Woodside also won both the 100 Fly (1:00.23) and 100 Free (53.20), collecting 60 individual points of the teams winning total (768).

Joining Woodside in winning multiple events was both Lia Borja and Kiley Kawai.  Borja captured both the 1-meter dive (194.65) and 3-meter dive (216.3) competitions while Kawai was a winner in both the 100 Backstroke (1:00.81) and 200 Backstroke (2:16.60).  

Orange Coast had two other winners with Gia Cadiz winning the 200 Fly (218.93) and Rylie Fox capturing the 50 Freestyle (24.74).

Riverside City finished second on Saturday.  The Tigers were led by Jessie Nelson and Annabella Storar, who captured five events between the two of them.  In total, the duo scored 117 individual points for the Tigers.  

Nelson was a dominating force, winning three separate events.  She won the 200 Individual Medley (2:12.53), 400 Individual Medley (4:46.08) and 200 Breaststroke (2:26.95).  Storar was a winner in both the 200 Freestyle (2:00.94) and 1,650 Freestyle (18:36.88).  

Golden West edged Saddleback for third place at the OEC Finals, 449.5-379.5.  Kady Ryder-Stout led the Rustlers with second place finishes in both the 200 Individual Medley (2:16.86) and 100 Fly (1:00.30) while finishing third in the 200 Fly (2:23.90).  Saddleback was led by Julia Reid, who won the 100 Breaststroke (1:08.57) while finishing second in both the 50 Freestyle (25.24) and 200 Breaststroke (2:27.02).

Orange Coast College will host the 3C2A State Championships on May 2-4.  Orange Coast and Riverside City both figure to challenge for a state title.  OCC finished third in 2023 after winning three straight championships from 2018-2022 (no meet in 2020 or 2021).  RCC has been knocking on the door in recent years, finishing 8th, 9th and 8th over the past three state meets dating back to 2019.

TEAM SCORES: 

Release by Brad Hoiseth, Saddleback