Mt. Pleasant girls repeat as WPIAL Class 2A swimming champions
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Friday, March 3, 2023 | 8:42 PM
The Mt. Pleasant swimming team poses with the 2023 WPIAL 2A team championship trophy Friday at Trees Pool.
Mt. Pleasant’s Sarajo Gardner takes fourth in the WPIAL Class 2A girls 100-yard backstroke during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday at Trees Pool.
Mt. Pleasant’s Joseph Gardner wins the WPIAL Class 2A boys 100-yard breaststroke during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday at Trees Pool.
Mt. Pleasant’s Lily King wins the WPIAL Class 2A girls 100-yard freestyle during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday at Trees Pool.
Mt. Pleasant’s Kiersten O’Connor with the start in the WPIAL Class 2A girls 100-yard backstroke that she finished third in during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday at Trees Pool.
Mt. Pleasant’s Lily King swims the anchor leg in the WPIAL Class 2A girls 400-yard freestyle relay during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday at Trees Pool.
Franklin Regional’s Paityn Blakley takes eighth in the WPIAL Class 3A girls breaststroke during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday, March 3, 2023 at Trees Pool.
Franklin Regional’s Aiden Bunker takes seventh in the WPIAL Class 3A boys breaststroke Friday, March 3, 2023 at Trees Pool.
Franklin Regional’s Holden Thomas takes third in the WPIAL Class 3A boys 100-yard backstroke during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday, March 3, 2023 at Trees Pool.
Penn-Trafford’s Patton Graziano taked second in the WPIAL Class 3A boys 100-yard backstroke during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday, March 3, 2023 at Trees Pool.
Norwin’s Anna Little takes sixth in the WPIAL Class 3A girls breaststroke during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday, March 3, 2023 at Trees Pool.
Hempfield’s Camryn Watters takes fifth in the WPIAL Class 3A girls 100-yard backstroke during the WPIAL swimming championships Friday, March 3, 2023 at Trees Pool.
Hempfield’s Dominic Falcon takes second in the WPIAL Class 3A 100-yard freestyle during the WPIAL swimming championship Friday, March 3, 2023 at Trees Pool.
The Mt. Pleasant girls swim team completed Friday what they started Thursday.
Swims at the top and throughout a deep lineup produced points in nearly every race, and it translated to the Vikings’ second straight WPIAL Class 2A championship.
“It is awesome,” said a soaked Mt. Pleasant coach Sandy Felice shortly after taking a celebratory plunge into the pool with her team.
“I don’t even have words to express it. I’ve been with these kids since they were like 6. The senior girls have all been with me at the aqua club that I’ve coached. I am going to miss them, but I am happy they are going to move onto college. A lot of them are swimming in college.”
But Felice isn’t ready to say goodbye to the seniors just yet as they will help lead the Vikings to the PIAA championships March 15-18 at Bucknell University.
The Vikings’ 290 team points were 92 better than runner-up Northgate. Quaker Valley placed third (189).
“It is an amazing feeling to know that all the hard work we put in last year and again this year continues to pay off,” senior Reegan Brown said.
“(Thursday’s) success really gave us the energy we needed to do what we did (Friday). It helped a lot.”
Mt. Pleasant began and ended Friday with record-breaking swims.
Sophomore Lily King crushed her own WPIAL Class 2A record in the girls 100-yard freestyle. Her time of 48.58 seconds was a second and a half better than her 50.03 from last year.
She owns three of the four girls Class 2A freestyle records, as she already broke the 50 free mark and added the 200 free Thursday.
King’s 100 time Friday also is faster than the Class 3A WPIAL record of 49.53 set by Gateway grad Olivia Livingston in 2017 and is better than both the PIAA Class 2A (49.57) and Class 3A (49.01) records.
“I definitely felt really good in my race,” King said.
“Coming off of yesterday and how everyone did, there was a lot of energy, and it helped push everyone to today. It definitely helped me a lot. I came in with a lot more confidence and feeling a lot better than yesterday.”
The Mt. Pleasant girls 400 free relay of King, Brown and seniors McKenna Mizikar and Trinity Graft lowered the team’s WPIAL record set last year, establishing a record of 3:32.07.
“Being the first person in the relay, I want to give my team the lead,” Brown said. “To watch them keep it going and to close out the win; it was amazing.”
The Mt. Pleasant girls added five top-eight medals Friday to their overall two-day haul.
Mt. Pleasant sophomore Joseph Gardner didn’t let the girls team have all the record-breaking fun Friday.
Gardner, runner-up last year to Southmoreland’s Henry Miller in the Class 2A 100 breaststroke, claimed gold in the event this year with a WPIAL-record time of 55.81 seconds.
It was a fast final heat as Indiana junior Alex Bauer also swam faster than the previous WPIAL record (56.99) and finished runner-up with a time of 56.27.
“I felt great,” said Gardner, who added the 100 breast title and record to Thursday’s fourth in the 200 individual medley.
“Now I want to move forward and look forward to that next race. I will just continue to train. After this meet, my taper will start (for states). Yardage goes down, and that means I should feel great. The better I feel, the faster I’ll swim.”
The Mt. Pleasant boys, who capped their two days with a fourth in the 400 free relay, placed sixth in the Class 2A team standings with 160 points. Latrobe finished eighth overall.
Only the WPIAL champion in each event earns an automatic berth to the PIAA championships.
The other at-large selections — up to 32 for each individual and relay event — will be determined from all of the district meets across the state. The PIAA plans to release the state-qualifier lists at noon Sunday.
Westmoreland swimmers went 1-2 in the Class 3A boys 100 free as Penn-Trafford junior Patton Graziano came from the third seed to win in 46.51.
He edged Hempfield senior Dom Falcon by 12 one-hundredths of a second.
Graziano, seventh in the 100 free last year, is the first Westmoreland County boys swimmer to claim the Class 3A 100 free title since 2012, when Latrobe’s Lucas Bureau won the event for the second straight year.
“That was just really nice to see,” Graziano said about touching the wall and seeing the ‘1’ beside his name.
“All of the hard work paid off. It’s just a great feeling.”
Falcon earned silver (46.63) in the 100 free after his WPIAL title Thursday in the 50 free.
“I looked up and saw ‘2’ and obviously, I was disappointed I didn’t win. But I was still ecstatic that I got second,” Falcon said.
“The WPIAL is a meet filled with great swimmers, and getting second is such an honor.”
Graziano also bested Falcon for the 100 free top spot when they went head to head in a dual meet at Hempfield and at the Westmoreland County Coaches Association meet at the end of January.
“We’ve been racing all year,” Graziano said. “It’s been fun. We really push each other. The races have been close every time. I thought it would be close (at WPIALs) between us and two other guys.”
Graziano was right back in the pool for the 100 backstroke, and he picked up a second-place medal in a time of 50.39.
North Allegheny junior William Gao won his second WPIAL individual title of this year’s championships with a 100 back time of 49.54.
Franklin Regional junior Holden Thomas claimed third in the 100 back (50.45) as the Panther boys finished sixth in the Class 3A team standings.
Latrobe sophomore Lauren Bell placed third in the Class 3A girls 100 free in a personal-best time of 52.11 seconds. She knocked nearly two seconds off her seed time.
She tied for fifth in the 100 free in her WPIAL debut last year.
“I felt really good in that race,” said Bell, who also finished fifth in the 100 butterfly Thursday.
“I was expecting to drop time. My time at WPIALs last year (53.28) was faster than my seed time coming in (54.03). But I didn’t expect to go that fast. I was pleased with my time.”
Michael Love is a TribLive reporter covering sports in the Alle-Kiski Valley and the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh. A Clearfield native and a graduate of Westminster (Pa.), he joined the Trib in 2002 after spending five years at the Clearfield Progress. He can be reached at mlove@triblive.com.
Tags: Franklin Regional, Hempfield, Mt. Pleasant, Penn-Trafford
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