Even a change of venue just 24 hours before the fact did not stop the Skaneateles girls swim team as it once again claimed the Section III Class C championship.
In Friday’s sectional meet at Rome Free Academy, the Lakers, with 418 points, dominated 11 other entrants in the field, with Holland Patent (284 points) far back in second place.
They were supposed to hold the sectional meet at its traditional venue, Nottingham High School. But problems with the bulk heads that popped up during the Class A and B meets on Thursday forced Section III officials to make the switch to RFA, in order to make the fixes necessary to hold the state qualifier on Saturday.
Those repairs were made, but Skaneateles didn’t mind the switch, because from the start of Friday’s activities at the RFA pool, it was in full control.
The quartet of Haley Buchholz, Leah King, Nikki Cole and Emily Wirth began the Lakers’ title run when they swam the 200 medley relay in a time of 1:59.93, more than eight seconds ahead of runner-up Lowville.
Then Rachel Teixeira took over. In the 200 freestyle, Teixeira won in a time of 2:02.12, with Halle King fifth (2:18.01) and Maddie Bohrer (2:19.28) in sixth place.
It was even more convincing in the 500 freestyle, where Teixeira, in 5:29.67, beat the field by more than 14 seconds as Halle King (5:59.68) worked her way to fourth place.
With those wins in the bank, Teixeira went to the 200 freestyle relay and, combined with Leah King, Krissy Chalupnicki and Ellen Legg, won in 1:50.41, holding off Holland Patent (1:51.33) for that title.
Finally, in the 400 freestyle relay Teixeira was part of a fourth victory as she, along with Cole, Wirth and Buchholz posted the only sub-four-minute time (3:55.03), leaving Cooperstown (4:09.54) and the rest of the field far behind.
Just before that final relay, Cole earned first place in the 100 breaststroke in a time of 1:13.56, beating Sherburne-Earlville’s Elizabeth Bachman (1:18.01) by 4.45 seconds. Cole was also second (25.53 seconds) to Pulaski’s Breanna Burns (25.27 seconds) in the 50 freestyle.
Legg, fourth in the 100 breaststroke (1:20.55), did better in the 200 individual medley, where she claimed third place in 2:32.82 as Leah King (2:35.01) was fifth.
Buchholz worked her way to third place in the 100 backstroke in 1:08.90 and got fourth (1:08.31) in the 100 butterfly, just 0.05 seconds ahead of Leah King in fifth. Wirth finished third in the 100 freestyle in 1:00.58, while Chalupnicki (1:03.01) was sixth.
Two days earlier, in the sectional Class C diving competition (which was held at Nottingham), Megan Molnar earned a solid fourth-place finish with 272.1 points. Utica-Notre Dame’s Sierra Raux won with 290.85 points.
Back at Nottingham on Saturday for the state qualifying meet that doubled as the overall sectional tournament, Skaneateles actually finished 10th among 29 teams with 107 points, by far the best total of any Class C side.
Teixeira, just 24 hours removed from her Class C heroics, rose to third place in the 200 freestyle, improving to 2:01.56, a number topped only by West Genesee’s Olivia Castro (1:56.74) and Auburn’s Michaela Elliott (1:58.63). It was the Lakers’ lone top-six individual effort.
