Cheyenne Mountain captures 4A boys swim and dive title
THORNTON — Daniel Carr learned a valuable lesson during this spring’s boys high school swim season.
“High school swimming is so much fun,” the Cheyenne Mountain sophomore said.
After spending his freshman year training for nationals instead of swimming for his high school, Carr took a page from Missy Franklin’s playbook and stuck with his high school friends.
It paid off Saturday as Carr set a pair of state records in helping the Indians capture the team title from three-time champion Air Academy.
Cheyenne Mountain scored 354 points to outdistance the Kadets by 34.5 points. Thompson Valley was third with 199 points.
Carr set the tone in the day’s third race, establishing a new 4A state mark in the 200-yard individual medley. His time of 1 minute, 48:93 seconds bettered the old standard by nearly two and a half seconds.
Carr swam the second leg for the Indians in the finals’ first race, the 200 medley relay. They finished second to Air Academy, which shattered the state mark it had set in Friday’s preliminaries.
“It made me mad,” Carr said of his performance in the relay. After Air Academy’s Tommy Baker pulled off a mild upset, setting a 4A record in winning the 200 freestyle, Carr was up again for the IM.
Carr followed that up with a time of 44.67 in the 100 freestyle, good for a new state mark by more than three-quarters of a second.
“I knew at the beginning of the meet I wanted the 100 free,” Carr said.
The Indians capped off the meet and secured the state title by winning the 400 freestyle relay in record fashion on 3:06.60, bettering the five-year old 4A mark by more than two seconds.
Cheyenne Mountain came into the state meet with a lot of confidence, having gone unbeaten during the regular season.
“We were hoping that our (with) our depth, the fest of the guys would come in and score a lot of points,” said Indians coach Kate Doane, whose team won its first boys state swimming championship since 2002.
Doane was named the 4A coach of the year.
Air Academy’s Caleb Hicks pulled off a mild upset by winning the 100 butterfly in a 4A record time of 49.63 seconds. Teammates Tommy Baker and Hunter Doerr claimed state titles in the 200 and 50 freestyles, respectively.
The Kadets claimed their second state relay record in winning the 200 freestyle in 1:23.24, more than three seconds under the previous mark.
Thompson Valley dominated the diving competition, capturing three of the top four places – including boasting the state champion, senior Kyle Pape, who edged teammate Collin Williams by less than four points for the title.
The Eagles also got a victory from Liam Gately in the 500 freestyle and from John Thorne, who broke his day-old record by winning the 100 backstroke in 44.30 seconds.
D’Evelyn’s Daniel Graber defended his state title in the 100 breaststroke.
