WATERTOWN – Gearing up for bigger meets in a few weeks’ time, the Fayetteville-Manlius boys swim team went to the top of the standings during last Saturday’s Watertown Invitational.
All told, the Hornets gained 629.5 points nearly doubling the total of runner-up Baldwinsville, whose 348 points edged Lowville (346) in third place.
And it didn’t take long for F-M to dominate, as in the opening 200-yard medley relay Ben Prendergast, James Cao, Neil Adamski and Derick Wang went one minute 43.22 seconds easily topping B’ville’s 1:50.83.
Jack Prendergast won twice, his 1:52.14 in the 200 freestyle beating a field which included Silas Kligerman getting third place in 2:00.43 and then adding a second title by going 5:16.10 to win the 500 freestyle, Kligerman again third (5:25.45) as Nolan Campagna (5:41.57) and Zach Winans (5:42.10) were fourth and fifth, respectively.
On his own, Cao swam the 100 backstroke and, in a season-best 59.87 seconds, edged the 1:00.09 of Watertown’s Drew Wekar, with Brandon LeRoy going 1:06.66 for fifth place as Adamski held off B’ville’s Adrian Clay, 1:01.89 to 1:03.16, in the 100 breaststroke to easily set a new season mark.
Ben Prendergast would pull away and win the 200 individual medley in 2:13.69, while Anthony Bottar was third in 2:19.34 and Vlad Roman gained fourth place in 2:21.67. Bottar later added a sixth in the 100 breaststroke.
Wang, in 22.98 seconds, was second to Lowville’s Banyan Barker (22.31) in the 50 freestyle as Alex Kim was fifth in 23.62, Wang adding a fourth in the 100 freestyle posting 53.29 ahead of Cao (53.75) in sixth place.
In the 200 freestyle relay Wang, Kim, Roman and Jack Prendergast went 1:35.44, just behind Lowville’s winning 1:33.96, while in the 400 freestyle relay the Hornets posted 3:37.70 and claimed third place.
As this went on, top Jamesville-DeWitt/Christian Brothers Academy divers took part in the Burgos Dive Invitational at Nottingham High School where Garrett Fuller joined Cameron Corona in qualifying for the state championship meet in March.
Fuller earned 453.40 points to beat the 450-point state qualifying standard, something Corona had done earlier this season as he took third with 480.80.
Kash Loomis was seventh with 404.95 points as Baldwinsville’s Nick Pompo won again with 533.20 points and Cicero-North Syracuse’s Nate Ornoski (489.55) was second. F-M’s Dylan Wang and Aiden Burke were 12th and 13th, respectively.