MARYSVILLE — Marysville teams won four out of 12 events and also showed in several more when the Tomahawk swim team hosted score-free jamboree at their pool Sept. 9.
Oak Harbor, Snohomish and Glacier Peak also proved competitive in the meet composed entirely of relays. While several events might have sounded familiar on paper to swimmers, none of the events that took place here will be seen again this season.
For example, M-P took second in both 400 medley relays. The first Tomahawk relay team of Melody Travis, Melinda Blomberg, Jewel LeValley and Kami Girard merely swam twice the distance of the usual meet-opening 200 medley relay. But when the event came around again later in the meet, the quartet of Leah Gordon, Amanda Collins, Karoline Schaufler and Megan Shoemaker each swam an individual medley for 100 yards, or half the distance of the usual 200 individual medley contest.
The Tommies won the 800 freestyle relay in 8:47.13, besting second-place Oak Harbor by more than 30 seconds. The team was composed of LeValley, Schaufler, Kendall Vincelette and Girard. M-P also easily won back-to-back events — a team diving event in a head-to-head competition with Glacier Peak, followed by a win in the 100 freestyle relay. The team of Girard, Blomberg, Emily Reinig and Rae Nall were seven seconds faster than the Everett team that placed second.
M-P got its fourth win in the three-man 150 breaststroke relay with Blomberg, Gordon and Shoemaker.
The girls followed up their jamboree effort with one that counted score-wise. In the program’s 23rd year attending the Bainbridge Relays, the Tommies took second place, rendering coach Jaci Legore Hodgins “one of the happiest coaches in the universe today,” she said after the Sept. 13 meet.
Like the jamborees, the relay meet depended as much on depth as individual talent. The girls won the 200 butterfly relay with a team composed of Schaufler, Mallory Hanson, Travis and Vincelette. The diving trio of Liz Kuljis, Sarah Clark and Marysa Eastman also won with style, finishing with a score of 290.9, less than a point behind the meet’s 14-year-old diving record.
The girls also placed second in the medley relay and an infamous “innertube race,” en route to a 44-point team showing, five points behind champion and host Bainbridge.
“The other big deal about this meet is we had a chance to see how we compared to Sehome, whom we swam on Thursday (Sept. 11),” Legore Hodgins added.
Since Sehome is a non-conference opponent, Legore Hodgins said she used the meet as an opportunity to give younger, less road-tested swimmers an experience in a visiting pool. M-P lost 119-64 there, but bounced back against Sehome, who scored only 20 teams points at the Bainbridge Relays.
Marysville faces Meadowdale in its first dual meet Sept. 18.
