SYRACUSE – What the Jamesville-DeWitt/Christian Brothers Academy boys swim team did throughout this winter carried over into a comprehensive victory in Wednesday’s Section III Class A championships at Nottingham High School.
Earning 365 points, the Red Rams were well clear of a field where Fulton, with 264 points, edged Liverpool (253) for second place, while Fayetteville-Manlius finished seventh with 173 points.
As they have done all season, Nathaniel Wales and Misha Kabunov led J-D/CBA, not only winning races, but putting up quick times that improved upon what they had already done.
Wales, in the 100-yard freestyle, prevailed in a season-best 46.68 seconds, beating his previous mark by more than a second and easily ahead of the 47.83 from Baldwinsville’s Mikey White as teammate Mark Bratslavsky was sixth in 50.42.
Then Wales went to his specialty, the 100 backstroke, and won in 52.13 seconds, slightly off his season-best 51.81, but still comfortably ahead of Cicero-North Syracuse’s Jacob Grffin (54.02) as F-M’s Carter Page was fifth in 58.67 and the Rams’ Kyler Huyck was sixth in 59.38.
Kabunov tore up the 200 freestyle, his 1:45.09 enough to qualify him for the state meet by more than two seconds as Fulton’s Bryce Rogers (1:47.51) was second and J-D/CBA’s Jamey Turo took sixth in 1:55.94.
In the 500 freestyle, Kabunov had gone 4:46.42 earlier this winter to qualify for the state meet and won here in 4:50.08, the only time under five minutes, nearly 16 full seconds ahead of Liverpool’s Nate Alexander (5:06.02). Lucien Zens took seventh in 5:27.35.
J-D/CBA also won a pair of relays. Wales, Bratslavsky, Misha Kabunov and Lesha Kabunov would hold off Fulton, 1:38.03 to 1:38.68, to take the meet-opening 200 medley relay, and in the closing 400 freestyle relay Bratslavsky, Wales, Misha Kabunov and Luke Marino won in 3:16.55, a season best, with Baldwinsville second in 3:19.26.
Lesha Kabunov took third in the 200 individual medley in 2:05.66 as Marino (2:09.08) was seventh, and later finished fourth in the 100 butterfly, his 55.54 seconds edging Marino (55.73) in fifth place.
Bratslavsy earned fourth place in the 50 freestyle in 22.51 seconds as Cameron Corona was fifth in diving with 427.75 points, ahead of Sean Rigdon in seventh (412.75) and Garrett Fuller (368.30) in 11th place.
F-M also had Eli Kligerman sixth in the 500 freestyle in 5:23.85, ahead of Ben Mathews (5:34.97) in 10th place, and eighth in the 200 freestyle in a season-best 1:56.87. Max Vidakovic got sixth in the 100 butterfly in 56.30 seconds and 10th in the 200 IM in 2:13.18.
Kligerman, James Cao, Jack Antshel and Derick Wang were sixth in the 200 freestyle relay in a season-best 1:34.49 ahead of J-D/CBA (1:35.69) in sixth place, with Vidakovic, Kligerman, Antshel and Cao sixth in the 400 freestyle relay in 3:34.14 as Page, Wang, Vidakovic and Anthony Bottar were seventh (1:46.92) in the 200 medley relay.
