SYRACUSE – Unbeaten this winter, the Fayetteville-Manlius boys swim team leaned on a simple philosophy – build up depth in every single event and hope none of its opposition could match it.
And nobody did, at least in terms of whoever tried to unsuccessfully stop the Hornets from earning the Section III Class A championship Wednesday at Nottingham High School.
All told, 27 of the 30 competitors on the F-M squad were in the sectional meet, and together their total of 416 points led to a lopsided victory over the 291 put up by last year’s champions, Baldwinsville.
Only once did the Hornets win – in the 100-yard breaststroke thanks to Neil Adamski, who in 59.99 seconds improved upon his previous best time by nearly two full seconds and, by doing so, also beat the standard of 1:01.20 needed to advance to Ithaca College and next month’s state championship meet. Anthony Bottar finished eighth and David Park was ninth.
Also, Adamski nearly helped F-M win the opening 200 medley relay, joining Derick Wang, Ben Prendergast and James Cao to finish in 1:40.10 barely behind the 1:39.80 from Liverpool as both advanced to the state meet here, too.
Meanwhile, Misha Kabunov led the way for Jamesville-DeWitt/Christian Brothers Academy as it finished third with 278 points.
Kabunov’s time of 1:44.40 won the 200 freestyle, while F-M’s Jack Prendergast was third in 1:48.87. Over in the 500 freestyle no one got close to Kabunov as his 4:50.21 was nearly 10 seconds ahead of the 5:00.07 of West Genesee’s Gavin Flanagan, again with Prendergast (5:10.31) in third place.
Not to be left out, Lesha Kabunov went 2:00.90, the best time in the section this winter, to win the 200 individual medley, with the Hornets’ Ben Prendergast second in 2:06.29. He also went 53.32 for second in the 100 butterfly to Liverpool’s Jack Cavallerano (50.58) having already met the state meet standard with 52.96 earlier this season.
In the last event of the day, the 400 freestyle relay, Ryan Bannon and Jonas Sarmast joined the Kabunov brothers to win in 3:20.62 while F-M had Wang, Cao, Connor Kelly and Jack Prendergast third in 3:23.99.
Further aiding F-M’s winning effort, Wang finished fourth in the 50 freestyle in 22.87 seconds as Conor Kelly (23.06) was sixth, Cao going 58.52 for fourth place in the 100 backstroke and 51.03 for fifth place in the 100 freestyle ahead of Conor Kelly in seventh and Alex Kim in eighth place.
Silas Kligerman got to fifth in the 500 freestyle in 5:15.02. Ben Prendergast got sixth in the 100 butterfly and Kligerman took seventh in the 200 freestyle, with Anthony Bottar sixth and Vlad Roman seventh in the 200 IM. J-D/CBA took fourth (1:34.34) in the 200 freestyle relay.
Two days later in the sectional state qualifier, F-M got second place with 248 points, not quite able to keep up with New Hartford, whose 354 points secured the George Falwell Cup as J-D/CBA was fourth with 191 points.
Again winning twice, Misha Kabunov had to go 4:42.67 in the 500 freestyle to hold off New Hartford’s Troy Luley (4:44.85) and prevail as he also won the 200 freestyle in 1:41.44 well clear of a field which included Jack Prendergast getting third place in 1:48.08, just short of the 1:47.60 state qualifying standard.
Lesha Kabunov emerged victorious in the 200 IM in 2:00.71, with Ben Prendergast third in 2:06.67 and Bottar eighth, Kabunov adding a fourth in the 100 butterfly going 53.42 seconds. F-M got second (1:30.76) to New Hartford (1:28.32) in the 200 freestyle relay.
Manlius Pebble Hill standout Sun-Jin Shah had already qualified for the state meet in two events and, here, would finish third in the 100 freestyle in 47.92 seconds and third in the 100 breaststroke in 59.55.
This followed the Feb. 8 sectional Class A diving championships, where two state qualifiers from J-D/CBA, Cameron Corona and Garrett Fuller, both had top-five finishes.
Corona got to third place with a career-best 510.05 points, with Fuller’s 470.2 points putting him fifth. Loomis Kash rose to seventh place earning 408.35 points as F-M’s Dylan Wang got 275.05 points.
In the state qualifier Tuesday afternoon Corona moved up the standings, picking up 534.55 points which beat everyone except Baldwinsville’s Nick Pompo, whose 576.15 topped the standings again.
Fuller could not quite match his score from the Class A meet yet still finished fifth with 462.6 points. Kash earned 398.95 points and grabbed eighth place.