News you can use

Fast as ever: Ponies excel in home waters

George Ferguson Havre Daily News sports editor [email protected]

In a meet which featured some of the best Class AA swim teams in Montana, the Havre High boys and girls swim teams more then held their own. On Saturday at the Havre Community Pool, the Blue Pony boys raced to a stellar second-place finish while the HHS girls finished a strong third in the Havre Invitational. "It was great, the kids swam very hard," HHS head coach Chris Inman said. "But we also found some things we need to work on and that's what we are going to concentrate on this week." The Pony boys finished just 20 points behind first-place Great Falls High. The Bison scored 420 points to Havre's 400. Glacier High was a distant third, followed by CMR and Kalispell. On the girls side, as expected, defending AA champion CMR romped to a win with a whopping 724 points. GFH was second with 535 followed by HHS with 365 points. Glacier was fourth and Kalispell was fifth. "The girls finished right where I thought they would, and the boys, I was very pleasantly surprised with how they came out and performed," Inman said. "It was an excellent weekend." Individually, it was a good day between the lanes for the Ponies. On the boys side, Jake Lillevedt shined with a third-place finish in the 100 backstroke and a fourth-place finish in the 50 freestyle. HHS dominated the 50 free with John Perrodin coming in fifth and Evan Flathers sixth. Matt Olson also finished seventh. Flathers also had a strong finish in the 100 backstroke, coming in fifth, while Olson was eighth in that race. In the boys 100-meter free, Collin Frey-Carlson was a strong third, while HHS teammate David Jeffrey was fourth. Greg Rhines also just missed placing for the Ponies, finishing seventh in the 100 free. HHS also had some close calls, with junior Keenan Dolezal finishing seventh in the 100 butterfly and seventh in the 100-meter breaststroke, while Rhines finished seventh and Kelly Albright ninth in the 400 free. The HHS relay teams also finished fifth in all three relays. On the girls side, the Ponies got yet another outstanding meet from both Kacie Johnson and Megan Obrecht, as well as others. Johnson placed third in both the 100 and 200-meter freestyle races, and Obrecht, who was dealing with some sickness, placed third in the 100-meter breaststroke and fifth in the 100 butter- fly. Katie Johnson also placed ninth in the 100 free for the Ponies, while Mersades Lodge was 11th in the 200 free. Logan Bunton also had a great outingFor the Ponies. Bunton was HHS's highest finisher, as she swam a blazing 33.31 in the 50 free, good for second place, as well as finishing 10th in the 100 free. Samantha French also scored points for the Pony girls. She came in sixth in the 400 free, while teammates Madeline Rick, Shelby Friede and Megan Malisani finished right behind her. In the relays, the HHS girls were fourth in the 200 medley and fourth in the 200 free. "Evan Flathers swam very well, four or five seconds faster than he was at state last year. John Perrodin and Jacob Lillevedt also swam well.," Inman said. "Kacie Johnson also posted times close to state times last year. Megan Obrecht was sick but still swam well with times close to state times. "We haven't even gotten through the bulk of our training yet," she added. "We are still trying to get into shape, so it's pretty exciting about what our kids are hopefully going to accomplish." Havre High will close out the December portion of its schedule on Friday and Saturday with a pair of meets in Great Falls.

 

Reader Comments(0)

 
 
Rendered 03/18/2024 05:19