Back on Jan. 18, the West Genesee boys swim team went to Nottingham High School and took part in the Salt City Athletic Conference championships, where the Wildcats’ Justin Byrne emerged as the winner in the diving competition.
Earning 396.10 points, Byrne beat out Liverpool’s Uiry Grabovyy (375.15 points) for the top spot, with David Puma taking third place by earning 375.00 points.
Parker McIlroy, with 334.40 points, was fifth as Bryan Reichert finished seventh (302.65), Aiden Burlingame was eighth (274.65) and Kyle Collins got 11th place with 256.65 points.
As to the swimming portion, WG had several top-five finishes, including Ryan McMahon nearly winning the 100 breaststroke. In one minute, 4.66 seconds, McMahon was runner-up to Jamesville-DeWitt/CBA’s Nathan Chen, who won in 1:03.41.
Keegan Scharoun went to the 200-yard individual medley and, in 2:19.61, took third place. Scharoun also finished ninth in the 100 freestyle in 52.54 seconds, his best time of the winter by more than a second.
Alex Shuron finished fourth in the 100 butterfly in 58.04 seconds, just off his season-best 57.84, while taking 10th place in the 100 backstroke in 1:06.03.
In the 200 freestyle relay, the Wildcats got third place in 1:36 flat, while in the 200 medley relay, WG gained a fourth-place time of 1:47.53 and it was sixth (3:52.35) in the 400 freestyle relay. Tiernan Guy was 10th in the 50 freestyle, posting a season-best time of 24.50 seconds.
As a follow-up to this, West Genesee took on Fulton last Thursday night and lost, 101-84, to the Wildcats, seeing its regular-season mark fall to 5-3.
Byrne still won in diving, though pushed hard by Puma as Byrne had 233.70 points to Puma’s 230.90, while Reichert got 199.60 points and McIlroy had 197.35 points.
McMahon and Scharoun had two wins apiece, with McMahon going 2:10.65 to top Fulton’s Mark Tallents (2:12.97) in the 200 IM and then swimming the 100 breaststroke in 1:03.95, again with Tallents (1:06.26) in second place.
As for Scharoun, he went 52.97 seconds to get away from Fulton’s Ean Stevenson (55.04) in the 100 freestyle before a 100 backstroke where he zoomed to first place in 59.04 seconds, the Red Raiders’ Nate Archer (1:00.63) close behind.
Shuron chimed in by edging Fulton’s T.J. Clayton, 58.61 seconds to 58.92, in the 100 butterfly, also pairing with McMahon, Guy and Jackson Craig for a winning time of 1:39.08 in the 200 freestyle relay. In the 200 freestyle, Shuron, in 2:00.19, was inches behind the Red Raiders’ Bryce Rogers, who won in 2:00.04.
WG is in action again next Wednesday night, hosting Cicero-North Syracuse, before a Feb. 4 trip to Liverpool to close the regular season.
