Warsaw Swimming: Lady Tigers Win Comfortably, Tigers Edge Columbia City
WARSAW — Warsaw’s girls and boys swim teams both won their dual meet with Columbia City Tuesday night, but they did it in dramatically different fashions.
The girls topped the podium in nine of 12 events on the way to a comfortable, 108-75 victory over the visiting Lady Eagles, while Warsaw’s boys narrowly edged out their Columbia City counterparts, 92-90.
The Tigers trailed throughout the meet but moved into the lead with 12 points scored during the breaststroke, where Grant Knight (1:01.45) and Jacob Lalonde (1:11.25) went one-two, and Nathan Taylor finished fourth (1:15.41). The Tigers’ 400 free relay team of Michael Ray, Zach Lalonde, Evan Borchers and Alex Cook came up less than a tenth of a second short of Columbia City’s winning squad of Aaron Fix, Noah Johns, Ryan Devito and Matt Webber, clocking 3:30.62 to the Eagles’ 3:30.56, but their second-place finish secured them enough points to hold off the visitors despite their one-three finish in the meet capper.
All told, Warsaw’s boys won just five of the 12 events but used their depth to out-point the Eagles.
Ian Deming won the butterfly (59.04), and Lalonde (1:04.93) and Andrew Deming (1:07.68) finished third and fourth in the race, while Borchers won the 500 free in 5:14.36, and Knight, Jack May, Ian Deming and Nick Zogbi won the 200 free relay in 1:35.01. May also won the 1-meter dive with a 137.1 score ahead of Columbia City’s Telly Varga and his 133.1 score.
The Tigers finished two-three in the medley relay, Alex Cook (1:56.15), Borchers (1:56.21) and Zogbi (2:02.04) finished two-three-four in the 200 free, Knight was second in the individual medley (2:06.71), Lalonde was second (24.13) and Ian Deming was third (24.47) in the 50 free, and Lalonde placed second (1:01.55), Cook was third (1:01.72) and Zogbi finished fourth (1:02.08) in the backstroke.
The girls took top honors in the 200 free, the IM, 50 free, 1-meter dive, 200 free relay, breaststroke and 400 free relay.
Laurel Moller won the 200 free in 2:12.62, while Leah Reinholt was third in 2:22.9, and Moeller also out-touched teammate Lauren Kuhl in the 500 free, finishing first with a 5:47.01 stop ahead of Kuhl’s second-place, 5:47.57 time. Delaney Wihebrink (2:22.14) and Taylor Gunter (2:29.42) went one-two in the IM, and Olivia Herman took top honors in the 50 free (26.24), where teammates Julia Vanhouten (28.84) and Bella Coffing (28.9) placed third and fourth. Wihebrink earned another individual win in the breaststroke in 1:10.2, while Maddie Ray and Ella Knight were third and fourth, respectively, in 1:20.63 and 1:21.87. Gunter won the fly in 1:04.88, and Maddie Ray finished third in 1:15.93.
Emma Pena scored 141.55 to win the dive, and Shelby Paseka was second with a 134.15 tally.
Wihebrink, Lillian Boston, Elizabeth Stone and Moeller earned a rare tie for first place in the 200 free relay with Columbia City’s Shauna Young, Mykaela Crowell, Lindsey Hoskins and Caroline Klimek as both squads clocked 1:51.06, and Reinholt, Kuhl, Coffing and Morgan Bruner finished off the meet in style with a winning, 4:09.73 turn in the 400 free relay.
The Tigers improved to 5-2, and the Lady Tigers moved to 6-1 headed into winter break. They will resume their meet schedule on Jan. 3 when they face Rochester, Huntington, and Tippecanoe Valley.