Heart. Drive. Undeniable Talent.
Girls and Boys Swim hosted competitive opponents Bergen Catholic and Immaculate Heart Academy at the Westfield Area YMCA on Thursday, with boys taking the 93-77 win and girls the 88-82 loss. However, both teams’ performances were impassioned and put them in better positions leading into the state tournament.
Westfield Boys consistently held high places throughout the meet. With strong performances by
Juniors Owen Waibel and Danny Pierce and senior captains Danny McGann and Charlie Jeckell, the boys were able to secure a stable lead throughout the 11 events.
Additionally, high energy surged throughout the deck, the boys had remarkable energy and that continued to push them through the meet. “We love having people behind us. You definitely feel the energy when you’re up for a race,” said McGann. Fueled by the audience and their own energy, the boys were able to have a particularly high performance in the 50 YD Freestyle race securing first, second and third place.
Moreover, in the 200 YD Freestyle Relay, Westfield’s first place finish with time 1:28.24 made up of McGann, Waibel, Michael Fischer and Dylan Lagrimas helped to deepen their lead toward the end of the race.
Jeckell commented on the importance of teamwork when facing strong competitors, saying,“It was our first meet where we really had fierce competition. I couldn’t be prouder of the way we’d done. Seeing the guys have each other’s backs was something I’ve been waiting to see all year. It was incredible.”
Head coach Jeff Knight agrees with Jeckell, also attributing the team’s drive as a result of “fantastic leadership” as the captains were “motivated” and “knew what this meant for the team as a whole.”
As for the girls, they had a similar spark of energy, but struggled to compete with IHA’s talented distance swimmers. While the girls have a strong line up of sprinters, they fell short in long-distance races.“The 500 yard freestyle was definitely the event we fell short,” said senior captain Emily Constable. Indeed, following that event, the girls lost their lead achieved earlier in the race, falling closely behind IHA with a score of 58-52.
Nevertheless, the girls performed well in several other races, particularly the 100 YD Freestyle, where Constable, Jane Kavanaugh and Brooke McAndrew won first, third, and fourth place, respectively. Similarly, in the 100 YD backstroke, senior captain Clare Logan had an impressive performance, placing first with a time of 55:73, finishing 7.78 seconds ahead of second place.
Despite the girls coming up short to IHA, they completed their goal for this challenging meet. “Our goal today was to put ourselves in a good position in PowerPoints for the end of the season,” according to head coach Steve Whittington. As a team gains more power points throughout regular season meets, their seeding for the state tournament will improve. After the meet, Whittington said that the girls are “definitely on the right path.” He looks forward to future meets as well, saying, “all the big meets that we swim [our times] are getting just a little faster.”
Logan added, “I think our team swam really fast and saw a lot of best times with some of our younger swimmers.”
Looking ahead, the boys and girls will take on the Union County Championships this weekend at Rutgers University Werblin Recreation Center. The girls will swim at 1:30 pm, and the boys will follow at 5:00.
