News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon

Outlaws swimmers excel at Districts and advance to State

Sisters High School swimming finished another season with outstanding individual and relay results in the nine-team District 3 Championships in Albany on February 11-12.

Eleven Outlaws swimmers will move on to the State meet at Mt. Hood Community College February 18-19.

Katie Stewart, Tia Berg, Michelle Young and Samantha Williamson opened the District 3 Swimming Championships with a first-place in event No. 1, the medley relay.

Stewart led the group in a strong backstroke segment (31.5), followed by Tia Berg in the breaststroke (36.9), Michelle Young in the butterfly (28.2) and Samantha Williamson in the freestyle (27.3). The relay's final time of 2:03.9 was 4.4 seconds faster than their preliminaries time the day before. The girls earned an automatic berth at state.

Event No. 15, the girls' 200-yard freestyle "A" relay with sophomore Katie Stewart (28.15), freshman Codie Lagao (28.68), junior Samantha Williamson (27.16) and junior Michelle Young (26.20) also went to the Outlaws with a gold medal standing (1:50.19). The relay earned an automatic state appearance.

The "B" relay (2:01.1) with Geneieve MacKenzie (30.9), Marci Calavan (30.7), Cierra Tigard (30.5) and Tia Berg (29.0) earned medals for their sixth-place finish in the same event.

In spite of an incredible effort and a 10-second time drop from preliminaries to finals in the 400-yard freestyle relay, Stewart (1:02.2), Berg (1:03.5), Williamson (1:01.9) and Young (58.7) could not keep the Sweet Home "A" team from grabbing first place in a remarkable race. Two of Sweet Home's girls swam splits of 58 seconds, the other two 1:01 and 1:03 respectively. Stayton, Blanchet, Cascade and Philomath finished third through sixth

place.

Other top finishers at District Championships include a second-place by Michelle Young in the 100-yard butterfly (1:06.3), and a third-place by Katie Stewart in the 200-yard individual Medley (2:25.6) which qualified both girls for the state meet.

Codie Lagao finished in the medal round with her third-place performance in the 100-yard backstroke (1:13.2) and Samantha Williamson earned a fifth-place medal for her 100-yard freestyle (1:03.2).

Top finisher on the boys' side was Tyler Baldessari with an outstanding swim and second-place finish in event 18, the 100-yard backstroke (1:00.26). Baldessari's performance puts him into fifth place for prelims at next weekend's championships.

Tyler Berg was third in the 500-yard freestyle (5:47.1), Ian Baldessari fifth in the 100-yard breaststroke (1:15.8) and Brennan Miller seventh in the 100-yard backstroke (1:04.15). Miller's time earned him a wild card for an appearance at State Championships next weekend.

The boys' "A" 200-yard medley relay with Tyler Baldessari (backstroke 28.2), Ian Baldessari (breaststroke 33.9), Jake Miller (butterfly 29.1) and Tyler Berg (freestyle 25.1) was third behind Sweet Home and Philomath and the foursome of Berg (57.0), Flanders (56.3), Jake Miller (54.3) and Tyler Baldessari (53.4) added another third-place finish to their medal count. Their final time of 3:41.0 in the 400-yard freestyle relay was also good enough for a spot at state championships.

Jake Miller (25.39), Brennan Miller (25.89), Tyler Berg (26.55) and Seth Flanders (24.78) earned a fifth-place in the 200-yard freestyle relay (1:42.6). Sweet Home won the event in a tight race with Philomath and qualified for state in second place (1:33.6) behind North Bend (1:32.7).

Overall, the Outlaws girls and boys finished in fifth place behind Sweet Home, Philomath, Stayton and Sweet Home, Philomath and Central.

 

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