On the way to an eighth consecutive victory, the Liverpool boys swim team vanquished one of its biggest rivals for local supremacy.
The Warriors put away Jamesville-DeWitt/CBA 100-81 on Wednesday night, twice sweeping the top three spots in individual races and also seeing J.J. Ross qualify for March’s state championship meet with his victory in the 100-yard butterfly.
Ross was challenged by J-D/CBA’s Spencer Schultz in what turned out to be the closes individual race of the day. In 53.64 seconds, Ross edged Schultz (53.84 seconds), but both beat the state qualifying standard of 53.95 seconds.
Two other times, the Warriors got 1-2-3 sweeps, starting in the 100 freestyle, where Curtis Merrick, in 50.83 seconds, beat out Griffin O’Neil (51.58) and Nate Geary (52.21).
In the very next race, the 500 freestyle, Will Allen earned the victory in 5:32.95, less than a second ahead of Kyle Richardson, who was second in 5:33.74 as A.J. Wagner was third in 5:47.33.
Tom Griffin, who won the 50 freestyle in 21.96 seconds ahead of Ross (22.61 seconds), went on to the 100 backstroke and, in 54.29 seconds, beat J-D/CBA’s Chris Bushnell (54.65 seconds) as Griffin Merkling was third in 57.25 seconds.
Merkling had already beaten the field in the 200 freestyle in 1:53.33. Griffin, Ross, O’Neil and Johannes Vorbach prevailed in the 200 medley relay in 1:40.89 as Vorbach, in 1:04.03, beat out Schultz (1:04.72) in the 100 breaststroke. Merrick, Geary, Ross and Brandon Nguyen were victorious in the 200 freestyle relay in 1:30.99.
As this went on, Cicero-North Syracuse, who faces Liverpool next week, traveled to Auburn, where it defeated the Maroons 87-68.
Tanner Dwyer, in 26.97 seconds, edged Dom Bagozzi (27.03) in the 50 freestyle, with Eli Ward prevailing in the 100 butterfly as part of a 1-2-3 sweep with Joe Gucciardi (1:17.65) and Jon Smith (1:19.63).
Sean Payrot needed 1:06.96 to prevail in the 100 backstroke. Dwyer, Connor Petralia, Bruce Hepel and Garrett Pitre won the 200 freestyle relay in 1:45.06 as Hepel was second in the 200 freestyle and Payton Connors posted 1:11.61 in the 100 breaststroke.
