Even as it rolled through an undefeated 2017-18 regular season, the Liverpool boys swim team remembered how, the season before, it finished second to Watertown in the Section III Class A championship meet.
That didn’t happen again.
Led by two wins apiece from seniors Tom Griffin and J.J. Ross, the Warriors pulled away for this season’s sectional Class A title Thursday at Nottingham High School, earning 447 points as the Cyclones were second with 362 points and Baldwinsville (265 points) edged out Jamesville-DeWitt/CBA (262 points) for third place.
On his way to getting named Swimmer of the Meet, Griffin got going with Ross as they, along with Johannes Vorbach and Griffin Merkley, prevailed in the 200-yard medley relay in one minute, 38.31 seconds, just ahead of J-D?CBA’s 1:38.72 effort.
For individual events, Griffin concentrated on the sprints, and in the 50 freestyle held off B’ville’s Alex Hiltbrand, 21.70 seconds to 21.79. Then, in the 100 freestyle, Griffin won in 47.84 seconds and qualified for the state meet in that event as Matt Geary finished ninth.
Ross would earn his state championship berth in the 200 freestyle, prevailing in 1:45.96, nearly two seconds under the state qualifying standard of 1:47.60 as Griffin O’Neil got third place in 1:48.31.
When he returned for the 100 butterfly, Ross was chased by J-D/CBA’s Spencer Schultz, but still held on to win in 52.85 seconds to Schultz’s 52.99, with B’ville’s Alex Hiltbrand (53.59 seconds) also reaching the state meet.
Liverpool gathered up points in every event. In the 200 freestyle relay,Griffin, Geary, Merrick and Nguyen went 1:29.19 behind the Cyclones’ 1:28.58 as, in the 400 freestyle relay, Ross, Geary, O’Neil and Curtis Merrick went 3:19.74 as Watertown won in 3:16.24.
O’Neil worked his way to second place in the 500 freestyle in 5:03.22, edging Merkling, who got third place in 5:03.26. A.J. Wagner made it to eighth place in 5:25.31, improving his time by more than 22 seconds in that race as Will Allen finished 11th.
Merrick contended in the 100 backstroke and finished third in a season-best 56.17 seconds as Kyle Richardson rose to fifth place in 58.66 seconds and Jack Andrejko was ninth in 59.88 seconds.
Vorbach made his way to third place in the 100 breaststroke in 1:01.55, beating his best time of the winter by more than a second as he also was sixth in the 100 butterfly in 55.89 seconds, beating out Richardson (56.98) in seventh place. Dan Stapleton needed 1:06.20 to finish eighth in the 100 breaststroke.
In the 200 individual medley, Merrick got fourth place in 2:06.48, just ahead of Merkling (2:06.13) in fifth place as Brandon Nguyen was sixth in 2:10.64 and Lachlan Eicholzer 10th in 2:16.32. Uriy Grabovyy was 10th in the diving competition with 292.55 points, with Nguyen 11th and Julien Brownlow 12th in the 100 freestyle.
Meanwhile, Cicero-North Syracuse was seventh in the Class A team standings, getting its best finish from Sean Payrot as he was fifth in the 100 freestyle in 49.94 seconds to go with a sixth-place time of 22.69 seconds in the 50 freestyle.
The Northstars were fifth in the 200 medley relay in 1:46.98 as Payrot, Payton Connors, Adam Rein and Eli Ward took part, Ward later finishing 10th in the 50 freestyle in 23.65 seconds before returning in the 200 freestyle relay to help Connors, Payrot and Logan Petralia get fifth place again in 1:32.17.
Connors took seventh place in the 200 IM in 2:10.65 and was 10th (1:00.18) in the 100 backstroke. C-NS took seventh in the 400 freestyle relay in 3:37.84 as Dan Shaw earned 280.70 points for 12th place in diving. Petralia was 15th in the 200 freestyle and helped Bruce Hepel, Tanner Dwyer and Ryan Heitman finish seventh (3:47.43) in the 400 freestyle relay.
