McCallie, Baylor tie for state swimming title

McCallie repeated as a Tennessee high school boys’ state swimming and diving champion Saturday in Knoxville, but the Blue Tornado had to share their 21st TISCA title. They and their Chattanooga rivals, Baylor’s Red Raiders, wound up tied for the top spot with 248 points.

The Baylor girls also repeated as champs, and Baylor ran away with its 15th consecutive combined championship. Baylor totaled 543 combined points, to 289 for runner-up Maryville. The Lady Red Raiders topped second-place Harpeth Hall 295-220.

Montgomery Bell Academy was third in the boys’ competition with 172.5 points.

McCallie, which led Baylor 108-98 after Friday’s session, earned the first-place tie with a victory in the final event, the 400-yard freestyle relay, while the Red Raiders finished fifth. The Tornado’s Will Jackson, Strib Stribling, Kyle Berry and Sam Powe won in an automatic All-America time of 3:05.87.

Swimming in the same University of Tennessee Alan Jones Aquatic Center where he will compete collegiately, Jackson won the 200 and 400 freestyle events and helped Conor Kinley, Stribling and Reece Gallagher win the 200 free relay in All-America time (1:24.81).

Powe, Gallagher, Berry and Kinley set a school record with their winning All-America 1:32.99 200 medley relay, and Powe won the 100 backstroke and was second to Jackson in the 200 free. Gallagher was seventh in the 100 breaststroke and eighth in the 200 individual medley, and Finley was eighth in the 50 free.

Baylor’s Ellie Waldrep won the girls’ 100 butterfly in a school-record and automatic All-America time of 53.66 and was second in the 100 back with another All-America time (52.47). She, Jewel Gordon, Lydia Bohannon and Logan Watson-Brown won the 200 free relay in All-America time, after Waldrep, Gordon, Avery Wilson and Bre Belcher were second in the 200 medley relay, also in All-America time.

Nic Brando, Alex Borisov, Daniel Unhuryan and Aidan Sims were second in the boys’ medley relay, and Will Tippett, Borisov, Noah Althoff and Sims were second in the 200 free relay. Borisov and Unhuryan were second and third in the 100 breaststroke, Borisov was third in the 200 IM, and Sam Flack was third in the 500 free.

Watson-Brown was third in the girls’ 200 free, and freshman Lillie Boggs was third in the 200 IM and 50 free.