Bolstered by a third-place finish at the SeaKing District meet, the Bainbridge swim team heads into today’s 3A state meet confident of improving on last season’s sixth-place finish.
“Greg (Colby, assistant coach) scored it out and has us second,” head coach Kaycee Taylor said. “If we keep every place that we currently have, that’s what we’ll be is second – and all the other teams do the same.”
The state meet preliminary round begins at 1:45 p.m. Friday at the King County Aquatic Center. Finals start at 10:15 a.m. Saturday.
The Spartans won three events at the district meet, setting a school record in the 400-yard freestyle relay.
“District was really really good,” Taylor said. “Going into it we thought (we’d place) maybe fourth. Greg scored it out it looked like we could get as high as second. We just missed that mark by five points.”
The Spartans scored 171, five points behind second-place Lakeside. Defending state champion Mercer Island took first with 345.5 points.
“Third is still our highest finish in I don’t know how long,” Taylor said. “If you look at individual finishes, everyone had great finishes – great races. If they didn’t drop time, they beat their opponent by enough time that it didn’t really matter.”
Senior David Ortyn won the 100-yard butterfly with a time of 53.35 seconds and took second in the 200-yard individual medley. Sophomore Andrew McCarthy won the 500-yard freestyle (4:43.54).
The Spartans’ 400-yard freestyle relay team of Ortyn, senior Cody Jenkins, McCarthy and sophomore Colin Chupik also took first with a time of 3:17.11.
“The 400 freestyle relay – every single time, it drops,” Taylor said. “I lose track of how many times they beat that (record). It’s a great place to be right now.”
The team has qualified swimmers in all individual events but diving.
“We aren’t swimming all those events (at state), but still the team qualifying for every single event is pretty big,” Taylor said.
“We could fill all the events if everyone could swim more – there’s a limit.”
Bainbridge’s strategy involves spacing out each swimmers’ individual and relay events at the state meet.
The Spartans have five swimmers in individual events. McCarthy will swim the 200-yard and 500-yard freestyles. Jenkins and Ortyn will compete in the 100-yard butterfly and the 200-yard individual medley; Chupik will swim the 50-yard freestyle and the 100-yard freestyle, and senior Jeff Yalung will compete in the 100-yard breaststroke.
Ortyn, McCarthy, Jenkins and Chupik will also swim the 200-yard medley and the 400-yard freestyle relays, the first and last state events, respectively.
“It’s really nice the way they’re spread out over the whole lineup of events that they’re able to get the rest that they need and gear up for the next race,” Taylor said. “When we only have eight swimmers the strategy is basically set now. I can’t swap in any other swimmers.”
Senior Zach Morrow, Yalung, junior Blake Harper and senior Sam Pollock will swim the Spartans’ 200-yard freestyle relay.
Bainbridge SeaKing District meet results
200 medley relay: Ortyn, McCarthy, Jenkins, Chupik, 7th (1:44.12)
200 free: McCarthy 4th (1:46.79)
200 IM: Ortyn 2nd (1:58.58), Jenkins 7th (2:01.89).
50 free: Chupik 2nd (22.61)
100 fly: Ortyn 1st (53.53), Jenkins 3rd (53.89), Morrow 11th (57.15)
100 free: Chupik 3rd (49.05)
500 free: McCarthy 1st (4:43.54)
200 free relay: Morrow, Yalung, Harper, Polock, 5th (1:36.94)
100 breast: Yalung 10th (1:06.85)
400 free relay: Ortyn, McCarthy, Jenkins, Chupik, 1st (3:17.11), school record
