In many ways, the Cicero-North Syracuse girls swim team’s season peaked on Sept. 25, when it went to Liverpool and stunned the Warriors 94-92, ending years of domination by Liverpool in that neighborhood rivalry.
Just as important as the bragging rights was the fact that the Northstars, at 5-0, were still undefeated and now had a chance to go to the top of the CNY Counties League.
But that meant going to Camillus Tuesday night and trying to end West Genesee’s five-year undefeated streak, and the Wildcats made sure that didn’t happen, sweeping the early races and never letting C-NS into the argument in a 102-76 defeat.
It wasn’t until the final two events that C-NS could get a first-place finish, starting with Jamie Rolf taking the 100-yard breaststroke in 1:15.03, and continuing with Kiersten Coates, Sara Dembowski, Brooke Fedi and Lauren Thorne going 4:08.26 in the 400 freestyle relay.
Before that, though, it was all Wildcats, with three different swimmers winning two events apiece, including Olivia Castro, who tore through the 50 freestyle in 25.24 seconds and the 100 freestyle in 56.94 seconds.
Elsewhere for WG, Kaitlin Dunning won the 200 freestyle (2:05.30) and 500 freestyle (5:35.66), with Shannon Cahalan taking the 200 individual medley (2:21.95) and 100 backstroke (1:04.74). The Wildcats also won the 200 medley relay in 1:59.67 and the 200 freestyle relay in 1:48.33.
Liverpool, looking to recover from that bitter C-NS defeat, hosted Christian Brothers Academy last Wednesday night, and it proved to be an exciting meet from start to finish, the Warriors needing its best stuff to defeat the Brothers 97-89.
To get it started, Madeline Murphy, Olivia Corlett, Maddie Rose and Sydnie Sovinsky had to swim the 200 medley relay in 1:59.61 to beat CBA (2:02.12) and gain an early edge.
From there, Murphy went on to win both sprint races, going 24.85 seconds to pull away from CBA’s Tessa Queri (26.47 seconds) in the 50 freestyle and win again, 56.68 seconds to Queri’s 59.34, in the 100 freestyle.
Sovinsky got through the 100 butterfly in 1:00.26 to beat Julia Torell (1:03.31), who had won the 200 IM. Two tight races were split, with Sovinsky holding off Annie Fletcher, 5:22.37 to 5:22.47, in the 500 freestyle and Julia Telesca, in 2:09.45, finishing inches behind Katie Toole (2:09.37) in the 200 freestyle.
Ali Testone, in 1:19.91, edged Rose (1:20.18)in a close 100 breaststroke after Corlett finished second (1:08.44) to Fletcher (1:03.33) in the 100 butterfly. Sovinsky, Telesca, Murphy and Sarah Piraino were victorious in the 200 freestyle relay, again winning a tight one, 1:47.65 to CBA’s 1:48.09.
