La Salle-Peru co-op junior Sam Nauman has dreamt of winning an IHSA state medal.

This weekend that dream became a reality.

Nauman, a Henry-Senachwine student, placed fourth in the 100-yard backstroke in 55.38 seconds and also finished 10th in 2:04.01 in the 200 individual medley at the FMC Natatorium in Westmont to bring home two state medals.

“Oh my goodness, it feels so good,” Nauman said. “I’ve wanted an IHSA medal for a long time now, so it’s cool to come home with two. It’s kind of mind-blowing, honestly.”

Nauman is the first swimmer in the L-P girls program’s history to win a medal and is the first swimmer - boy or girl - from L-P to bring home state hardware since 1956, according to the IHSA website.

“That’s really cool,” Nauman said about being the first medalist in girls program history. “I didn’t realize going into this meet until (Coach) Rob (McNally) was talking about it that I would be the first to possibly earn points or even medal. I hope it sets a precedent and others will follow in my footsteps in years to come and more girls will come home with medals and points.”

Behind Nauman’s pair of medals, the Cavaliers placed 25th in the state meet.

“She’s the first girl at L-P to be able to medal and she did it with a lot of class and style,” McNally said. “She bettered her time in both events. She was four hundredths of a second off her preliminary time in the backstroke (finals), but she dropped additional time in the 200 IM and picked up four places. She did really well. I’m very proud of her.

“She scored points for L-P. It was fun to see L-P High School on the scoreboard.”

On Friday, Nauman punched her ticket to the finals and guaranteed herself medals by swimming a program-record 2:05.05 to tie for 14th in the 200 IM preliminaries before coming back later to swim another program-record 55.34 for the fourth-fastest prelim time in the 100 backstroke.

“I was ecstatic with how my swims went,” Nauman said. “I had amazing weekends back-to-back with sectionals. With dropping so much time at sectionals, I wasn’t really expecting a major time drop at state, so to go really fast in prelims felt amazing and gave me confidence for (finals).”

On Saturday, Nauman cut more than a second off her 200 IM time and moved up four places. She swam four hundredths of a second slower in the 100 backstroke but maintained her fourth-place position.

“My jaw quite literally dropped after the 200 IM and I looked up at my time because I was tied for 14th (Friday) night and placed 10th, so I was just shocked to see my time. It felt really good,” Nauman said. “My backstroke, I was really, really happy with how that went after a long day. Since I had such a time drop in the 200 IM, I was hoping for a time drop in the backstroke, but I held my own. I added four hundredths of a second, so that’s faster than a blink. I’m extremely happy with it.”

Nauman earned her medals in a one-class sport, so she’s swimming against girls from much larger schools. The swimmers ahead of her in the 100 backstroke came from St. Charles North (1,851 students), Rolling Meadows (1,793), Dundee-Crown (2,405), while there were swimmers in the 200 IM ahead of her from Lane Tech (4,376), Stevenson (4,720) and Evanston (3,465).

“It’s really cool that I can hold my own coming from a school that has less than 150 students against the 4,000-student schools,” Nauman said. “It’s cool to see that we’re all the same.”

Nauman said it took a lot of work to get to the state podium.

“I swim year round,” Nauman said. “It’s been a long process to get to this point, so to see it all finally pay off is kind of mind blowing. It’s a lot of work year round, but I’m willing to put in that work and I’m really happy when I get to see the results.”

McNally said Nauman’s success comes from her work ethic in and out of the pool and her willingness to be coached.

“She puts in the work,” McNally said. “It’s like any athletic endeavor, if you put in the work, you’re going to have success. She responds well to instruction in the pool. She pushes herself really hard every time at practice.

Her work ethic sets her apart from a lot of other kids I’ve coached and the payoff is what happened (Friday) and (Saturday).”