Gutsy and at times dominant was the best way to describe the effort put forth by the Washington swim team at the NCHSAA 3-A state meet at the Triangle Aquatics Center in Carry on Thursday.
The Pam Pack girls’ team continued to rewrite the Washington High School record book as it racked up 155 points to earn a school-best fourth place finish while the boys put forth a spirited effort to tally 29 points and overshoot expectations by placing 20th.
Leading the way for the girls’ team was junior Emily Pfeiffer who picked up Washington’s first-ever state championship in a swimming event by finishing the 100-yard breaststroke in an astounding 1:04.29. Not only was that time a personal best for Pfeiffer but also earned her all-American consideration and was less than one-hundredth of a second away from breaking the 3-A state record.
“She was phenomenal all day long,” Washington swim coach Spencer Pake said. “It’s a long day for these swimmers because they do preliminaries in the morning and then take a break and have to do it again at night. She came ready to swim. It was phenomenal to watch and be a part of it … She was very, very happy. The smile on her face was priceless.”
Pfeiffer pulled off the cycle of swimming as she added a silver in the 200-yard individual medley (2:05.29) and teamed up with Coastal Conference Swimmer of the Year Riziki Omonde, Lanie Godley and Megan Baldwin to finish the 200-yard freestyle relay in 1:41.74 to earn a bronze.
“That’s the first medal that a relay team has ever received at the state for swimming,” Pake said. “I just don’t know what to say about them, they’re all great swimmers.”
That relay team received a boost from the freshman Godley, who decided to continue to swim despite hurting her ankle earlier in the meet.
“During her 200 free she popped her ankle out and you could tell she was in pain,” Pake said. “She had the heart to comeback and swam in the last three events. I asked her if she wanted to sit out and she said ‘this state, there’s no way I’m sitting out.’ She didn’t want to let her team down.”
The Pam Pack relay teams were strong on Thursday as Chandler Beach, Jessica Penhollow, Kaitlyn Richards and Baldwin finished eighth in the 200-yard medley relay with a time of 2:01.82 and Omonde, Godley, Penhollow and Pfeiffer grabbed sixth in the 400-yard freestyle relay by finishing in 3:49.07.
In the 200-yard freestyle Omonde (2:04.49) and Godley (2:08.77) finished 15th and 16th, respectively, while Baldwin swam a 25.77 in the 50-yard freestyle to nab eighth. Omonde also placed ninth in the 100-yard freestyle (55.62), Richards finished 22nd in the 500-yard freestyle (6:07.96) and Baldwin swam a 1:08.88 in the 100-yard breaststroke to place eighth.
In the boys meet, Gabe Shepard battled an injured ankle to place ninth in the 100-yard backstroke with a personal-best time of 56.74 and placed 18th in the 200-yard individual medley.
Like the girls, the boy’s strength resided in their relay teams. In the 200-yard medley relay Shepard, Daniel Crozier, Robert Sandy and Coleman Smithwick turned in a time of 1:51.12 to place 14th, while Sandy, James Martin, Luke Harris and Smithwick also placed 14th in the 200-yard freestyle relay (1:37.51). In the 400-yard freestyle relay Sandy, Martin, Harris and Shepard completed the event in 3:36.62 to place 13th.
“The boys were spectacular and that’s still not saying enough about what they did,” Pake said. “All three relays were underdogs and dropped a considerable amount of time. I was very, very pleased.”