ONONDAGA COUNTY – Anything the Liverpool girls swim team does the rest of the regular season will feel special, even if it doesn’t compare to what it did on Sept. 23, ending the 64-meet win streak of Fayetteville-Manlius.
Of course, the Warriors still have an SCAC Metro division regular-season title to chase, and know it might all ride on the last meet of the season Oct. 25 against rival Cicero-North Syracuse,
So Liverpool couldn’t afford any letdown – and it did not have one last Tuesday, in its first meet since the F-M upset, when it put away Jamesville-DeWitt 102-82.
Again, the Warriors leaned on a series of high finishes in all the races to make up for the Red Rams’ individual efforts, such as Gwen Lister winning the 100 freestyle (56.60 seconds) and 200 freestyle (2:03.79).
But Kaitlyn Thompson won two races of her own, going 26.20 seconds to dominate the 50 freestyle before she went to the 100 backstroke and prevailed in 1:04.97.
Emerson Gellert, second in the 100 backstroke (1:10.16), beat the field in the 100 butterfly in 1:07.58, while Sarah Colwell needed 5:45.47 to go 1-2 with Chloe Brown (6:06.06) in the 500 freestyle after she swam to second in the 200 freestyle in 2:09.45.
Arianna Kuznia, second in the 100 freestyle in 58.69 seconds, helped Colwell, Gellert and Thompson go 1:47.06 in the 200 freestyle relay to pull away from J-D’s 1:51.60. That same quartet went 4:01.84 in the closing 400 freestyle relay.
Kerry Hunter was second in the 100 breaststroke in 1:20.58 while, in diving, June Piorkowski, with 190.45 points, edged Sofia Valente (188.90) for the runner-up spot.
Now the Warriors were off until an Oct. 11 meet against New Hartford as C-NS would have its own important meet against F-M Friday night at Nottingham High School, but take a 92-89 defeat to the Hornets.
Here, the Northstars watched as F-M piled up points throughout the night, also winning every race in the early stages except for Leah Benedict going 1:04.70 to go 1-2 with Kate Gucciardi (1:05.68) in the 100 butterfly.
Kaitlyn Carroll continued to dominate on the diving board, her 257.95 points well clear of the 190.55 from F-M’s Devon Sedlack as Gucciardi would take the 100 backstroke in 1:05.10 and Cassidy Svoboda, in 1:17.68, prevailed in the 100 breaststroke.
Leading the Hornets, Georgia Langan won twice, going 25.92 seconds to beat Rose Coleman (27.36) in the 50 freestyle and exactly 57 seconds to prevail in the 100 freestyle.
Gucciardi, Benedict, Svoboda and Coleman were second (2:01.40) to the Hornets (1:58.19) in the 200 medley relay as that same quartet went 1:50.62 in the 200 freestyle relay, which F-M claimed in 1:47.88.
