Swimming quartet takes trophy at state

By the narrowest of margins the Sisters High School girls swim team brought home some hardware at the 4A/3A/2A/1A OSAA State Championships held February 16 and 17 at Mount Hood Community College in Gresham.

The Outlaws' strong finish in the final event of the day, the 400-meter free relay, pushed them one point ahead of the Tillamook Cheesemakers to claim fourth place, good enough for a trophy.

North Bend took top team honors with 66 points, followed by Sweet Home (57), and Catlin Gabel (52). Sisters scored 34 points for fourth place behind record-setting performances from the four qualifiers representing the Outlaws. Hawley Harrer, Brook Robillard, Meredith Mandal and Lydia Bartlett qualified in three relays together and each also competed in one individual event. The top six finishers advance from the preliminaries to the finals.

After getting all but one of its qualifiers into the finals on Friday - Mandal finished seventh in the 500-yard free in the prelims to miss the finals by one place - the Outlaws got the scoring underway in the first event of the day on Saturday as they took fifth in the 200-yard medley relay in a time of 1:56.79. Catlin Gabel won the event in 1:47.23.

It was Bartlett's fast finish that vaulted the Outlaws into fifth place in the race, one place ahead of Tillamook, which would turn out to be the difference between the two teams in the final standings by the end of the day.

The time set a new Sisters High School record, which turned out to be the first of five the girls set before the day was finished.

Harrer kept the scoring going in the 50-yard free, finishing fourth in a tight race with a time of 25.56 to earn three more points for the Outlaws. Vianka Hoyer of North Bend won the race in 24.39.

Bartlett set the next school record and came within a whisker of being the state champion in the 500-yard freestyle, touching the wall just .25 seconds behind league rival Lauren Yon of Sweet Home, who won the race in 5:04.52 to Bartlett's 5:04.77. The pair finished nearly seven seconds ahead of the third-place finisher.

"That race couldn't have been more exciting," said Bryn Singleton. "Yon started out very quickly, but Lydia just kept with it and really closed in the final three laps."

The Outlaws had another runner-up finish and school record in the 200-yard freestyle relay, finishing 1.3 seconds behind the team from North Bend 1:40.64 to 1:41. 94. Lydia Bartlett got the Outlaws to an early lead, but North Bend chipped away to claim the win.

In the 100-yard backstroke, Brooke Robillard battled to fifth place with a time of 1:11.43 and another school record. The winner, Eva Carlson of Catlin Gabel, set an all-time state record for 4A/3A/2A/1A with a time of 1:03.39, six full seconds ahead of second place.

The 400-meter freestyle relay secured the trophy for the Outlaws as the foursome placed a solid second with a time of 3:45.81. The Huskies of Sweet Home won the race with a fine time of 3:37.67. Catlin Gabel, which had swum 3:41 in the preliminaries, was disqualified in the finals.

"We actually broke two school records in the 400 relay," said Singleton. "Lydia swam the first 100-yard leg faster than any Outlaw ever, and then our final time as a team also broke the previous record."

For Singleton, in her first year as head coach, it was a perfect in to a successful season for the program.

"We had a record number of kids out for the team, which made the season more fun than ever, and then seeing these four fantastic girls pull together such a great season finale was very

satisfying."

Harrer is the lone senior, so juniors Robillard and Mandal, along with sophomore Bartlett, will give Singleton a solid foundation again for next year.

The state trophy was the third of the year for a Sisters girls team this year as the volleyball squad, led by Harrer, won the state title, and the cross country team earned a fourth-place trophy.