Big Spring Swim Team puts together strong showing in Seminole over weekend
The Big Spring Swim Team participated in their final meet before Winter Break last weekend at the Seminole Tri-Meet. The schools that participated were Abilene Wylie, Big Spring, and Pecos. It was a strong day in the pool for the Steers as a team with the women defeating both Abilene Wylie (84.00 – 77.00) and Pecos (94.00 – 66.00), while the men defeated Abilene Wylie (108.00 – 67.00) but lost to Pecos (124.00 – 95.00). In the combined scores, Big Spring lost a nail-biter to Pecos (190.00 -189.00) but cruised to a victory over Abilene Wylie (192.00 – 144.00). Seminole's pool does use a meter pool opposed to a yard pool, so the times do seem slower than usual.
“Its always difficult to convince kids that they swam well at this meet every year,” Head Coach Randall Shaw said. “When they are use to swimming a :29 on a 50 free in a yard pool then we go to Seminole and they swim a :34 for a 50 free in a meter pool. If you calculate the times and convert back to a yard time we are actually faster than we were in most of our swims.”
The following are the results for Big Spring's swimmers from the Seminole Tri-Meet this past weekend:
In the Girls' 200-yard medley relay, the quartet of Arely Cruz-Garcia, Naomi Reyes, Katherine Greene, and Malaki Vaughn finished in first-place with a final time of 2:43.41.
In the Boys' 200-yard medley relay, the group of David Summers, Ismael Castillo, Manuel Castillo, and Smith Cate were finished in third-place (2:23.62).
In the Girls' 200-yard Freestyle, Jayda Overton (5th, 3:24.15) and Katherine Greene (6th. 3:24.44) rounded out the competition by finishing almost in unison.
Christian Pantoja-Strickland finished third in the Boys' 200-yard Freestyle (2:47.15).
Sophomore David Summers was the only Steer or Lady Steer to compete in the 200-Yard IM and was able to finish in third-place (3:14.10) behind two Pecos swimmers.
Malaki Vaughn finished in first-place in the Girls' 50-Yard Freestyle with a final time of 33.81 seconds. Her teammates Brooklynne Heffle (6th, 40.56) and Steffany Pina Arment (8th, 45.23) also finished in the Top 10 performers for that specific race.
In the Boys' 50 Yard Freestyle, Manuel Castillo (1st. 27.78) was the top Steer finisher and won the race. Fellow Steer swimmers Smith Cate (7th, 30.13), Ismael
Courtesy Photos
Castillo (11th, 36.44), Carson Millsap (12th, 36.15), Toby Phillips (13th, 36.27), Ethan Barker (14th, 38.76) and Matthew Nieves (15th, 40.98) rounded out the competition.
Katherine Greene finished in second-place (1:49.76) in the Girls' 100-Yard Butterfly while teammate Naomi Reyes did not finish.
Senior Manuel Castillo wad the only competitor in the Boys' 100-Yard Butterfly and finished in second-place (1:14.01).
Malaki Vaughn finished in first-place (1:15.03) of the Girls' 100-Yard Freestyle while her teammate Jayda Overton (4th, 1:32.62) also placed in the Top Five.
Smith Cate finished second in the Boys' 100 Yard Freestyle with a final time of 1:10.08. His teammates Toby Phillips (4th, 1:18.67) and Carson Millsap (7th, 1:22.93) also competed hard in the event and put together a solid showing for the team.
Arely Cruz-Garcia placed second in the 400-Meter Freestyle (6:23.62) while Christian Pantoja-Strickland (2nd, 6:04.54) and Morgan Griffith (3rd, 6:21.03) took up two places in the Top Three of the same competition on the men's side.
The group of Naomi Reyes (33.06), Malaki Vaughn (34.53), Jayda Overton (37.91), and Arely Cruz-Garcia (34.36) took home first-place in the Girls' 200-Meter Freestyle Relay with a total time of 2:19.86.
Big Spring finished third in the Boys' 200-Meter Freestyle Relay with the grouping of David Summers, Ismael Castillo, Smith Cate, and Manuel Castillo (2:06.13). The second Big Spring group of Christian Pantoja-Strickland, Carson Millsap, Toby Phillips, and Morgan Griffith placed fourth (2:24.87).
Cruz-Garcia finished in fourth-place (1:35.45) in the Girls' 100-Meter Backstroke by narrowly beating out her teammate Brooklynne Heffle (5th, 1:47.93). On the boys' side, Summers placed second (1:28.65) while Barker finished in fourth (2:00.55).
Naomi Reyes finished in first-place in the Girls' 100-Meter Breaststroke (1:38.42), while Pina Arment placed third (2:02.09). On the boys' side, Griffith (5th, 1:46.87), Ismael Castillo (6th, 1:47.67), and Nieves (7th, 2:01.49), rounded out the race.
Lastly, the grouping of Greene, Heffle, Pina Arment, and Overton finished in third-place in the Girls' 400-Meter Freestyle Relay (6:25.23). On the boys' side, the quartet of Griffith, Pantoja-Strickland, Millsap, and Phillips finished in third-place out of three groups (5:29.84).
Shawn Moran is the sports writer at the Big Spring Herald. To contact him, e-mail sports@bigspringherald.com or call 432-263-7331.