Sean O'Shea may be within the blink of an eye -- closer than that, really -- from winning A&M Consolidated's first state swimming championship in 13 years

O'Shea will head to the UIL State Swimming & Diving Championships in Austin this weekend with a realistic chance at winning the Tigers' first gold medal at state since 1995. O'Shea, who also qualified in the 200-yard individual medley and on two relay teams, leads a contingent of five Consol swimmers who have earned berths in this weekend's Championships.

Consol's other state entries are members of the 200 medley relay and 200 freestyle relay teams. The medley relay includes Brett Cast, Benjamin Jackson and Stephen O'Shea, while Consol's freestyle relay lineup starts with Jack Burley and includes Jackson and both O'Shea brothers.

The meet will begin with preliminaries at 4:30 p.m. Friday at the Texas Swim Center. The finals will start at 3:30 p.m. Saturday.

O'Shea will go into the meet as one of the favorites in the 100 breaststroke. He posted the second-fastest time of any regional swimmer with a school-record 57.33 seconds, barely getting beaten by The Woodlands' Chad Sorenson at 57.21.

That difference of 12 hundredths of a second is less time than the 5 tenths it takes a person to blink an eye.

"I can't start and stop a stopwatch in 12 hundredths of a second," Consol coach Ryan Goodwyn said. "I can't hit start-stop that fast. That's how close they are."

While it's encouraging that O'Shea has such a small gap to close, there is little time to do it in. With two weeks between regionals and state, swimmers can't do heavy training. O'Shea has focused on improving his technique.

"I felt like I had kind of a bad finish at regionals," O'Shea said. "My dad recorded my race, and there was a lot of stuff I think I can improve on. My last lap and finish was kind of off. It's a matter of working on the little things, the technical things. Like my starts, turns and finishes."

Goodwyn said O'Shea's ability to deliver at big meets will give him a chance to become Consol's first state swimming champion since Bryan Jones in 1995.

"You can't ever expect anybody to win, especially at this level and when they're that close," Goodwyn said. "But Sean is very good at getting his game face on. I would say that's his strength. When it's time for a big meet, Sean knows how to not crack under the pressure."

Last year, O'Shea was part of Consol's 200 medley relay team that won a bronze medal. He also finished seventh in the breaststroke.

"It's been pretty cool to think that I might be able to get a gold medal at state," O'Shea said. "I don't know that one race in the final is going to be my best one, but I want to swim my best time this weekend."

Consol senior Jonathan Jackson went into last year's state meet with the best regional time in the 100 freestyle. He finished third in the state final.

"It's so hard just to get to state," Goodwyn said. "You have to be so much on top of your game at regionals. The goal at this point is to come back and be even faster, and that's the one thing in the past few years that we've had a hard time doing. Lots of schools have a hard time coming back from regionals."

• Larry Bowen's e-mail address is larry.bowen@theeagle.com.

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