Lewis Cass made it a three-peat at the Cass County girls swim meet on Monday at the Logansport pool.
The Lady Kings have won all three times since the event was first held two years ago.
They again won in convincing fashion with 55 points, followed by Logansport (34) and Pioneer (19).
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“We came into the meet with some jitters because we haven’t had a meet yet and the girls knew that they just had to come out and swim as fast as they could,” Cass coach Mandy Hall said. “I told them that really times aren’t what we’re looking for tonight. We’re looking for the places because first, second, and third score in this meet. And some girls seemed disappointed with some of their times, but I kept reassuring them that this is our first meet at the beginning of the season. We’ve got 11 weeks left to go and lots of room to grow and improve.”
Mia Hall was a quadruple winner to lead the Lady Kings. The junior swam to wins in the 200 IM (2:35.56) and 100 breaststroke (1:19.26) and was also part of the winning 200 medley and 200 freestyle relay teams.
Madelyn Hillis won the 100 free (1:04.48) for the Lady Kings. Mayce Armstrong was first in the 100 butterfly (1:19.71). Maleigh Deeter won diving (169.05).
Cass’ 200 medley relay team of Kennedy McLaughlin, Hall, Armstrong and Hillis won in 2:11.37. The 200 free relay team of Hillis, McLaughlin, Rielle Musgrave and Hall won in 1:59.33.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“We had a lot of great second-place and third-place finishes as well,” coach Hall said. “Our depth is what’s gonna carry us this season. I wasn’t expecting some of those first-place finishes from Logansport. They’ve got a killer freshman crew that came up and we were kind of biting our nails there for a minute. (Assistant coach) Blake (Guy) was scoring the meet out and before we hit diving it was only maybe a six-point difference. So we just reassured the girls that as long as you swim hard and give it your best, we’ll be proud of them. And they did that and we came away with the win.”
Logansport freshman Josie Dubes swept wins in the 200 free (2:23.17) and 500 free (6:39.96) in her varsity debut. Junior Bella Nicoles won the 50 free (:28.47) and nearly won the 100 backstroke, finishing runner-up in 1:12.71.
The Berries’ 400 free relay team of Nicoles, Dubes, Alette Woodhouse and Journee Cunningham won in 4:34.23.
“Now we know where we are and now we know where we’re going to improve,” Logansport coach Mike Shannon said. “The way that the girls have been working the last few weeks is just phenomenal. They have really been working hard. But unfortunately tonight we just came up a little short.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“The girls 400 free relay team of Bella Nicoles, Josie Dubes, Alette Woodhouse, Journee Cunningham, they just flat out swam. It was a heck of a showing. And we had a heartbreaker with the 100 backstroke. It’s the finite details, right? It’s you’ve got to do it over and over and over again. And unfortunately it was a soft touch on our end. And the official called that race to Pioneer. The backup stopwatches confirmed that the race did go to Pioneer. But what a heartbreak for Bella Nicoles. But here’s the important thing that I love is that she came out of the water saying, ‘Mike, that’s my PR.’ So that’s pretty fascinating that the kids are coming out of the water looking for a PR.
“If you think about it, Josie Dubes in the 200 freestyle as well as the 500 freestyle, what a stud, really. She comes into practice, she’s a completely different swimmer than what she was last year at the junior high. Bella Nicoles in the 50 free. Again, that’s her sectional time is what she just did. So we’re all moving in the right direction. Here’s what I love, our two flyers, Marilyn Macias and Emma Rogers, they matched their sectional times. Bella got her PR. There are just so many, just to name a few.”
Cailyn Colford had a win in the 100 backstroke (1:12.20) for Pioneer.
“This is our third meet. We’ve had a really strong start,” Pioneer coach Laura Duke said. “We moved up a really strong freshman class, so it’s been really exciting to see their improvement from junior high to now. We take every meet as we just want to improve. We’ve got a good senior class. Cailyn Colford, she has committed to Manchester, so we’re excited to see what she does this season. It’s always fun swimming against Lewis Cass and Logansport. They’ve built some really strong programs, so we know we always have tough competition when those two. But I think we had some decent swims overall.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“We’re about the same size of a team as we were last year. But Kenley (Jasmantas), she’s a crazy strong freshman. Molly Webber with distance all of a sudden kind of shocked us. So we’re really excited to see what these freshmen do and grow.”
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