A pair of Juneau swimmers will escalate their game as they head to swim for college in the fall of 2020.

Micah Grigg and Mesa Moran, of Thunder Mountain High School and Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaat.at Kalé respectively, will both continue to compete in swimming.

“We’re really proud of them. Both swimmers have been with us for a long time,” said Glacier Swim Club head coach Scott Griffith. “They’ve both been with us since they were 7 or 8 years old.”

Grigg is headed to Lenoir Rhyne University in North Carolina, and Moran is bound for University of Alaska Fairbanks.

“I’m really excited. It’s kind of cool because there’s a handful of girls on the team that I competed with before,” Moran said. “That’s going to be kind of cool, to be swimming with people who I’m familiar with.”

Mesa Moran, a Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé graduate, will be swimming for the University of Alaska- Fairbanks in the fall, signing with the school’s team this spring. (Courtesy photo | Mesa Moran)

Moran typically competed in mid-to-long freestyle and butterfly events. Grigg typically competed in longer swims, including the 500 and 1650 freestyle, Griffith said.

“Mesa’s always been a hard worker and a leader on the team,” Griffith said. “She feeds everyone to make everyone better.”

Moran said UAF’s Polar Bears were a good fit for her aspirations to teach, especially in today’s world.

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“We had been looking at it because it was an affordable school. It had everything I needed,” Moran said. “With the current events of right now, it’s really important to educate the youth. I’m pretty set on doing that.”

Grigg will be competing with less familiar faces, but perhaps seeing more he knows all the same.

“I have some family there,” Grigg said. “I picked the school for swimming and for their engineering. I’m excited to meet new people. There will be bigger competition because there’s not many swimmers in Alaska.”

That determination is part of how he was picked for the team, Griffith said. “Micah sets his goals for something, and for a distance swimmer, that’s important,” Griffith said.

Both have had a hard time training with pools closed. Moran said she’s been working out with her family, and Grigg said he’d been running distance each day to help keep in shape. Both swimmers expressed eagerness to get to school and move forward with things.

“Me and my family have been working out and stuff, but there’s not really not much we can do,” Moran said. “I tried swimming in it, got a wetsuit, but it’s still too cold.”

• Contact reporter Michael S. Lockett at 757.621.1197 or mlockett@juneauempire.com.