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| 200-yard relay team qualifies for state |
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| Sports | |||
| Written by David Wolman | |||
| Friday, 13 February 2009 09:00 | |||
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Last week, Sarah Dorsett was looking for an additional meet in which the Osawatomie-Paola boys’ swim team could compete. Taking a glance at the schedule, she realized her team had only nine meets scheduled — including Thursday’s Interleague Championship at the Miami County Family YMCA, the team’s regular season finale. The Kansas State High School Activities Association allows swim teams to compete in a maximum of 10 meets per season, so Osawatomie-Paola was looking to max out its opportunities. Blue Valley North came calling. And so Osawatomie-Paola headed north to Blue Valley North to compete Tuesday. “They welcome anyone for these meets because of the opportunity to get more guys involved in improving,” Dorsett said. It proved to be the perfect opportunity for the 200-yard medley relay of Daniel Dorsett, Jared Auten, Stetson Jackson and Eli Waddle to qualify for the state meet. Finishing in a time of 1 minute, 47.5 seconds — a 3.2 second improvement over their performance at the Feb. 3 meet at home — they punched their ticket for the Feb. 20 and 21 state meet in Topeka. It just happened to occur in the first event in Tuesday’s meet. “They had no competition in the field to push them. They knew it,” coach Dorsett said. “And they knew they were racing the clock only. The key to finally getting their time down was in the relay exchanges. They were focused and blasting off the block. It was a tremendous feeling to have our men’s high school first relay team ever qualify.” Auten had previously qualified for state in the 100 butterfly, so Dorsett is excited to see him have an opportunity to compete in the waters at the Hummer Sports Complex in Topeka with a few of his friends. “It is good for Jared to be joined by his teammates,” Dorsett said. “Other coaches saw it happening and gave us congratulations. They know how good it feels to do it, and were very encouraging.” Alex Weatherbie already qualified for state in both the 50- and 100-yard freestyle. Although no other Osawatomie-Paola swimmers qualified for state, many saw improvement in their times. Kyle Dietrich continued to knock off time in the 100 freestyle. He finished in 55.74 seconds — a four-second improvement off his performance at the Feb. 3 home meet. Two 200 freestyle relays — Osawatomie A (Dorsett, Auten, Jackson and Waddle) and Paola A (Weatherbie, Dietrich, James Teuscher and Gus Hart) — improved their state consideration times in the events. Paola A finished in 1:38.14. Jackson also swam to state meet consideration times in the 50 freestyle and 100 breaststroke. He recorded a personal best time of 24.51 seconds in the 50 freestyle. Hart and Dorsett were close to state consideration times in the 100 butterfly and 100 backstroke, respectively. Waddle (25.13), Dorsett (24.77), Dietrich (24.89) and Hart (25.24) all swam to personal best times in the 50 freestyle. No team scores were kept.
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