CENTRAL NEW YORK – Unbeaten and sitting atop the Salt City Athletic Conference midway through January, the Liverpool boys swim team had company with Fulton and Jamesville-DeWitt/CBA.
Two of them would go head-to-head last Wednesday night, and it was Fulton getting the best of the Warriors, the Red Raiders leading from the opening race all the way to the end as it prevailed 94-86.
Fulton won each of the first seven events. Not until the 500-yard freestyle, when Nate Alexander pulled away to take it in five minutes, 17.19 second and Ryan Vann (5:54.76), did Liverpool get in the win column.
Still, helped by a series of high finishes and Joe Lisi’s 100 breaststroke win in 1:08.20, the Warriors only trailed, 86-80, heading to the final race, the 400 freestyle relay.
Lisi and Alexander, joined by Jack Cavallerano and Trevor Selig, went 3:32.88, only to have Fulton’s quartet of Bryce Rogers, T.J Clayton, Chris Mandart and Logan Ames win in 3:31.17 and clinch the meet.
Cavallerano, in 23.09 seconds, was runner-up to Rogers (22.64) in the 50 freestyle and went 57.15 in the 100 butterfly to finish second behind Clayton’s 54.66. In the 100 backstroke, James Hayden’s 1:00.36 was runner-up to Mandart’s 59.99.
A tight 200 freestyle had Alexander, in 1:53.57, inches behind Mandart’s 1:53.53, and in the 200 individual medley Lisi went 2:08.74 but Clayton won in 2:08.03.
Selig went 52.45 seconds in the 100 freestyle, second to Rogers (50.52) as Colin Gridley was second in diving with 209.40 points to the 235.15 from Fulton’s Will Patterson.
Before they returned to regular-season action, Liverpool and Cicero-North Syracuse both made appearances at the Jan. 13 Griffin Sprint Meet at Nottingham High School.
To lead the Northstars, Joey Swenton nearly won the 100 breaststroke, his 1:04.62 only trailing the 1:03.68 from Oneida’s Sun-Jin Shah, followed by a 50 breaststroke where Swenton’s 29.44 was again runner-up to Shah, who went 29.14 as Donavan Medina (30.65) finished eighth.
Swenton added a fifth in the 100 individual medley in 59.63. In 25.56, Jacob Griffin got second to Skaneateles’ Gavin Van Kersbergen (25.14) in the rarely-contested 50 backstroke. Caden Griffin got third in the 100 butterfly in 56.56 and sixth in the 25 freestyle in 10.74.
In the 200 medley relay, Swenton and Anthony Gabrielli helped the Griffins get to third in 1:44.11. Cavallerano, Lisi, Alexander and Sean O’Neil had Liverpool fourth in 1:48.44.
Cavallerano was sixth in the 50 freestyle in 23.11 seconds and fifth in the 100 backstroke in 1:01.06. Gridley had 384.60 points for seventh place in diving. Lisi took eighth in the 100 IM in 1:01.16 and Alexander was 11th in the 100 freestyle/
C-NS went from here to Friday’s meet against Syracuse City, also at Nottingham, where the Northstars were able to prevail by a score of 95-78.
Caden Griffin, in 22.82 seconds, held off Jacob Griffin (22.83) by one-hundredth of a second in the 50 freestyle, with Jacob later going 52.34 in the 100 freestyle as Caden won the 100 butterfly in 58.53.
In the 200 IM, Swenton prevailed in 2:10.24 and later swam the 500 freestyle in 5:18.99. Connor Burke stepped up to take the 200 freestyle in 2:08.71 as Gabrielli swam the 100 backstroke in 1:02.52 and Medina went 1:11.14 in the 100 breaststroke.
