Jensen Keck stutter-stepped as she walked through the entrance into the Evanston Township High School pool on Friday morning for the state swimming meet and took a deep breath as she looked up at the small, confined arena filled with hundreds of parents.

DeKalb-Sycamore co-op coach Leah Eames tried to paint a picture of the meet for the freshman before they arrived, showing her pictures of the pool, talking her through what warm-ups would be like and trying to describe to her the madness that comes with the only state meet for swimming, which isn’t separated by classes. But stepping in and seeing the pool gave her pause.

“Which way should we go?” Eames remembers Keck saying before calmly leading her coach and her teammates, who came with to support her, into the bleachers.