Lewiston shows promise with a
ninth-place finish.
ORONO – It wasn’t a victory, or even a top-five finish, but the Lewiston High School girls’ swim team capped a solid season with a ninth-place finish in the Class A State Championships at Wallace Pool on the University of Maine campus Monday.
Isla Hanson, Emily Morin and Melissa Morin led the Blue Devils with a combined 57 points (including relays) as Lewiston garnered 58 points on the day, besting last year’s total.
“We’re very happy with the variety in the scoring,” Lewiston coach Dave Bright said. “We got all three relay events into the final round, and we definitely improved on last year.”
As expected, Cape Elizabeth was the big winner on the day, taking first place overall with a whopping 229 points, outdistancing Cheverus by 45. Bangor, expected to be the biggest challenge to Cape’s three-peat, was disqualified from the 400-yard freestyle relay in the preliminary round after one of its swimmers left the blocks before her teammate touched the wall below her.
“We were worried about them because they were so deep,” Cape coach Kerry Kertes said. “We had to counter that with some outstanding performances.”
“That really hurt us big time,” Bangor coach Cindy Howard said of the false start. “We did come back hard, though, and almost everyone on the team swam a personal best today.”
The Rams finished strong, scoring above their seeding in the remaining events, but it wasn’t enough, and they settled for third place with 163 points.
“Last year was much tighter than this,” Kertes said, “but this was going to be a lot closer before the DQ. The freshmen and sophomores really came through for us today.”
Cape senior Taylor McFarlane, who already held four individual state records (200 freestyle, 200 individual medley, 500 freestyle, 100 backstroke) and three as part of a relay team, added to her legacy at the school by setting yet another state mark, this time in the 100-yard freestyle. McFarlane was given the Swimmer of the Meet award after single-handily scoring 32 points and contributing to all three relay teams that racked up an impressive 76 points for the Capers.
“The last four years, we really have had a core group of girls that has come up big for us, and we all knew we wanted to go out with a win in our senior year,” McFarlane said. “The team came in a bit questionable, but we had a couple of younger swimmers step in. They swam out of their minds.”
Like McFarlane said, she wasn’t the only Cape swimmer to make an impact. Schuyler Armstrong and Emily Caras also contributed to the wide margin of victory.
“It will be a good group returning next year,” Kertes said, “but it will be different.”
In last year’s state meet, Bangor nearly caught Cape with its diving prowess. This time around, Cape managed two entrants in the top eight in the diving competition, and although Chandra Lippitt of Bangor took second in the event, Cape held off Cheverus, Deering and Scarborough, its next closest pursuers, after the three schools registered one diver combined in the final 12.
“I think this is the first time that I can remember that we placed a swimmer or diver in the finals on every event,” Kertes said. “I think the biggest key for us was placing three in the top six in the 100 free.”
One other record broken at the meet was the meet record in the 200-yard medley relay. Cheverus’s team of Jill Horan, Megan McCrillis, Meagan Morris and Em Youmans edged the 1:54.37 mark set by Westbrook in 1993 with a time of 1:54.01.
For the Blue Devils, the finish bodes well for next season. Lewiston graduates just a few swimmers after taking a strong second-place finish in the KVAC tournament this season. Brunswick, which finished first at the KVAC meet and sixth in Orono, has a senior-laden team.
“They’re already talking about taking aim at Brunswick next season,” Bright said, glancing back over at his swimmers. They’ll be ready.”
Deering and Scarborough rounded out the top five, while South Portland took seventh, Brewer took eighth and Sanford took No. 10.
Sophomore Mattie Fowler of Mt. Blue took a second in the 500 freestyle and eighth place in the 100 butterfly to give the Cougars their only points.
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