Swimming / Diving

Minus Stars, Teams Swim to Fifth at State

Girls Team Registers Best 5A Finish

By Zach Warner
The Southlake Journal

This year, there were no individual superstars to help motor the Carroll swim team to the 5A state meet.

The Dragons had plenty of talent, but no Wil Singley, Jeff Hendricks or Caitlin Baran to lead the way.

Instead, it was a matter of depth and solid swimming that brought both the boys and girls teams to Austin, where each group finished seventh as a team (girls with 108 points, boys with 92 points) among 5A competition. The seventh-place spot is the best the Carroll girls team has ever finished at state since moving up to compete in the largest UIL classification.

"We’re excited, because we feel that we’ve established ourselves as one of the best 10 and 10 teams this year [top 10 boys and top 10 girls in state],"said Kevin Murphy, Carroll swimming coach, who saw his girls finish a former best of ninth at state last year, while the boys took 10th. At the Jamail Swim Center in Austin last weekend, several that will be back on the team next year contributed. Of the eight boys and nine girls that reached state this year, all the boys and six of the girls return in 2009-10.

Top individual finishers included sophomore Connor Nolan in the 500 free (fourth place, four minutes, 30.61 seconds) and junior Claire Singley, also in the 500 free (fourth, 4:51.38). Four of the five Carroll relays at state also finaled, with the boys 400 free (Ian Rea, Andrew Goss, Connor Adams, Nolan) and the girls 400 free (Cassidy Lapp, Singley, Taylor Cole, Chelsea Dunlap) both taking sixth.

The girls 200 medley relay took sixth, the boys 200 free relay took eighth and the girls 200 free relay finished ninth to win the consolation final.

Individually, Dunlap (sixth, 100 breaststroke), Nolan (eighth, 200 individual medley), Rea (ninth, 100 free and 13th, 50 free) and Ted Singley (12th in boys 500 free) also finished the season strong.

"We feel we have a chance to be even better next year," Murphy said. "... This whole group of swimmers this year is a closer group and more interested in each other and less individualistic than any of the groups we’ve had before."

Meanwhile, senior diver Taylor Hryorchuk captured seventh place at the state meet, reaching the finals and serving as the school’s first diving representative at state.

"She was more relaxed than she was at the regionals," said Carolyn Hryorchuk, Carroll dive coach and Taylor’s mom. Taylor compiled 391.35 points at the meet, barely trailing sixth-place finisher Callan Buck of Keller (393.75). Kaylea Arnett of Spring won the girls event with a total score of 456.77.

Taylor was in fourth place in her seventh dive of the semifinals, but came up a little short on her final prelim dive and fell down to ninth. Knowing that her last three dives in the finals needed to be on in order to stay in the top 10 overall, Carolyn was a little leery when her daughter decided to do a very difficult dive – an inward double – that she was not used to performing as her final dive of competition.

"You jump out and flip toward the board," Carolyn said. "It’s one of those dives you could get your teeth knocked out on.

"You want at least two [of your final dives] to be some that you know that you can hit," she said. "She performed it really well … and that brought her back down to seventh."

For this article, full Carroll sports coverage and Southlake community news read The Southlake Journal every Friday or online at www.southlakejournal.com.