Records broken, points destroyed. Westfield swimming dominated the Union County Tournament on Jan. 21. With the boys taking first place for the 3rd year in a row and the girls placing second, Westfield solidified their superiority in the pool at Rutgers University.
The swim Union County Tournament is unique. Instead of building up to the UCT championship with the two worthy teams, all teams swim on one day for the title. The matchups consisted of 13 boys teams and 15 girls teams.
The boys started off hot, winning the 200 Medley relay and breaking a meet record. With a time of 1 minute 34.62 seconds, Danny Pierce, Dylan Lagrimas, Logan Swenson and Owen Waibel took first place and set the tone for the rest of the day. With 7 event wins out of 11, the boys were not there to play.
The 400 free relay, made up of juniors Waibel, Michael Fischer, Pierce and Swenson, followed and set a school and meet record, clocking in at 3:08.1.
“I was focused on getting a relay record because once I saw our lineup I knew we had our best shot to do it all season,” said Waibel. But individually, Waibel also broke both the 50 free meet and school record, swimming an impressive 20.74 seconds, along with the 100 fly record with a time of 50.97 seconds. “I think my performances in the 50 free and 100 fly hyped my team up game gave them confidence. We are a team that feeds off of each other’s success and I think we did exactly that,” he said.
Senior Charlie Jeckell has won counties every year since he has been in high school, despite freshman year where it was canceled due to COVID-19. “It was a great feeling. It’s always an electric meet. It was nice to get our first trophy of the season, and it’s a good marker as we reach for two more,” he said.
On the day, the boys scored 462 points while their closest opponent was 163 points behind.
Pierce, who took a first place, personal-best finish with a 52.15 seconds in the backstroke, said, “I just want to get everyone amped for the rest of the year and prove that we are not a team to be messed with.” And their showing at counties proved just that.
On the girl’s end, they fell short to their rival, Summit, who took first place with 390.5 points while Westfield had 375 points.
Despite coming just short of the title, the girls won 6 out of 11 events. The 200 free relay, swam by Jane Kavanagh, Ava Contract, Brooke McAndrew and Clare Logan, took a first-place finish in 1:39.77, along with the 400 free relay with Bella Giacobbe, Emily Constable, McAndrew and Kavanagh in 3:35.08.
The girl’s medley relay, consisting of Logan, Constable, Emily Kapuscinski and Giacobbe, squeezed a first place finish in 1:47.8, putting them ahead of many of their other competitors.
Logan and Constable both took individual victories. Logan won the 50 freestyle in 23.57 seconds and the 100 backstroke in 54.98 seconds, smoking her competition and dominating every race she was entered in. Constable swam a 1:04.5 second 100 breaststroke, defeating her competition and adding points to the board for Westfield.
“Everyone tried their best, and we had a lot of cheering. It was a lot of fun,” said senior captain Giacobbe.
After a powerful standing at the UCT championship, both teams look to take the rest of their seasons by storm as they look forward to the sectional tournament and state championship.
