Sun staff
Clermont County will be well represented across Division I and II at the Southwest Ohio District Swimming Championships this week as 22 student-athletes from four schools will compete in 11 events.
Milford High School leads the way with 11 swimmers and divers taking part in the district tournament, followed by eight from New Richmond, two from Glen Este and one from Bethel-Tate.
The diving portion of the district tournament took place midweek and results were not available at the time of this writing.
Three of the four members of the Milford diving team advanced to the districts, led by Joel Adams. Adams scored a 308.3 to qualify in ninth position for Tuesday, Feb. 17’s event held at Miami University. Teammates Zach Lorenz (252.5) and Cole Dunham (247.80) qualified 19th and 22nd, respectively.
Also competing earlier this week were a pair of divers from Glen Este, Baylee Lawson and Bethany Berger. The pair were first girls in school history to qualify for the diving district.
Lawson qualified in 15th position with a score of 340.30 and Berger ranked 21st with a score of 327.60.
The Division II district tournament, to be contested on Friday, Feb. 20 will have nine local swimmers competing.
The lone qualifying boys relay team from New Richmond was the 400 freestyle relay team of Austin Berger, Noah David, Derek Gelter and TJ Gelter finished in 23rd place in the district with a time of 3:58.35.
New Richmond’s relay team of Claire Burns, Ryan Allen, Jordyn Torrens and Alicia Bailey qualified in two events, the 200 medley relay and the 400 freestyle relay.
The 400 freestyle relay team finished 17th in the district with a time of 4:09.29 and the 200 medley team placed 23rd with a time of 2:06.80.
Torrens, a freshman, also qualified in two events individually, the 100 backstroke and the 100 butterfly. Her 1:03.21 qualifying time in the butterfly was 15th-best in the district and her 1:05.56 in the backstroke was the 21st-best.
Joining the four Lady Lions on the pool deck will be Bethel-Tate’s Gracyn McQueary. McQueary is a sophomore and the lone member of the Tigers swim team. As such, she practices out of Anderson High School. She placed first in her sectional in the 100 breaststroke and is seeded second in the district.
McQueary’s time of 1:07.94 was bested only by three tenths of a second by Michelle Prayson of Kettering Alter.
On Saturday at Miami University, the Aqua Eagles will descend onto the deck in a flock of eight. Two relay teams qualified through to the district tournament as well as one individual.
Paul Keefer will be the busiest Eagle swimmer on Saturday, competing in the 100 breaststroke and the 400 freestyle relay. Keefer swam the 100 breast in 1:04.06 to finished eighth at the Mason sectional and 25th in the district.
The boys 400 relay team of Keefer, Tyler Karan, Jan Rae Chavez and Jarrod Higgins finished seventh in the section and 24th in the district.
The same team is an alternate for the 200 medley relay.
The Lady Eagles 400 freestyle relay team of Cora Streit, Megan Hardewig, Katey Pena and Arija Walsh finished in sixth place at Mason, earning the 21st overall seed in the district.
The same team is an alternate for the 200 medley relay.
Full sectional and district results are available on swimmeet.com.
Correction: The original version of this story failed to note that the New Richmond boys 400 freestyle relay team qualified for the district tournament. That error, and errors in corresponding statistics, have been corrected.