WPIAL swimmers set for Thursday’s championship finals at PIAA Class AAA meet

By: HSSN Staff
Thursday, March 15, 2018 | 1:48 PM

LEWISBURG – The North Allegheny boys swim team captured five PIAA AAA championships on Day 1 Wednesday at Bucknell University.

The Tigers are hoping for a similar encore Thursday. They are off to a good start as Mason Gonzalez (100-yard freestyle), Rick Mihm (500 free), Andrew Zhang (100 backstroke), and the 400 freestyle relay are No. 1 seeds for the finals, set to begin at 6:05 p.m.

Also grabbing a top seed after the morning prelim swims was Upper St. Clair freshman Josh Matheny in the boys 100 breaststroke (56.17 seconds).

Other WPIAL swimmers set to compete in the boys championship finals include North Allegheny's Jack Wright (2nd seed, 100 free), Penn Hills' Kimani Gregory (3rd, 100 free), Upper St. Clair's Jack Fitzpatrick (2nd, 500 free), Seneca Valley's Owen Blazer (7th, 100 back), North Allegheny's Jerry Chen (4th, 100 breast), Pittsburgh Central Catholic's Gennarino Conzemius (5th, 100 breast), North Hills' Kevin Lovasik (8th, 100 breast).

Another battle in the 100 free between Pennridge senior Morgan Scott and Gateway sophomore Olivia Livingston has been set up for the girls AAA finals, set to begin at 8:35.

Scott swam a 49.82 in the preliminaries to grab the top seed, while Livingston checked in second with a 50.04. Scott edged Livingston to capture last year's 100 free title.

Butler's Laura Goettler is in the top spot for the finals in the 100 breast as she cut nearly a second from her seed time and finished the prelims with a 1:02.00.

Other WPIAL girls swimmers in a championship finals Thursday evening are Upper St. Clair's Abby Metheny (6th seed, 500 free) and Olivia Shaffer (8th, 500 free), North Allegheny's Torie Buerger (4th, 100 back), Ellie Tiskus (6th, 100 back), Moon's Leah Baker (7th, 100 breast) and Plum's Devan Taylor (8th, 100 breast).

All eight competitors in each individual or relay championship final are guaranteed a PIAA medal.

Michael Love is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at mlove@tribweb.com or via Twitter @Mlove_Trib.