North boys swimming: Weston nabs 2nd title in 3 years
WORCESTER >> After a year hiatus, Weston returned to the North Sectional winners’ circle in style.
The Wildcats turned on the jets midway through the contest to secure their second North Sectionals title in three years and 12th sectionals championship overall at the Swimming and Diving Tournament at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute Aquatic Center.
Weston held a small lead after the 100 Fly, the sixth event in the contest, after Nico Frangioni took first place with a time of 51.62.
But then the triple-threat of Evan Hoaglund, Austin Chiocca, and Alex Jylkka hogged the podium spotlight as they placed onetwo-and-three to sweep the medal stand and put Weston out front for good.
“We didn’t know three of our guys were going to finish in the top eight, but they just let it loose on that race,” said Weston head coach Jim McLaughlin, who is in his fourth season at the helm and 16th season overall with the Wildcats. “It did definitely turn the tables — that was the turning point of the meet.”
Hoaglund, who was also the Dual County League champion in the 100 free this season, posted a time of 46.10, only 0.09 off the meet record set by Corben Miles in 2016. Chiocca (48.58) and Jylkka (48.83) awed the crowd with the onetwo-three finish enroute to the team victory with 310 points.
Westford Academy was the North Sectional runnerup with 218 points, while St. John’s Prep (211), ActonBoxborough (186), and Lincoln-Sudbury (173) rounded out the top five schools.
The Weston trio of Hoaglund, Chiocca, and Jylkka were not finished as they paired up with junior Nate Whitworth to take first place in the 200 Free Relay with a time of 1:27.66. Chiocca also added a firstplace finish in the 50 Freestyle and Hoglund was second in the 100 Breaststroke at 59.66.
Hoaglund, Whitworth, Frangioni, and Eldar Blazh started things off by winning the 200 Medley Relay and McLaughlin felt it set the tone.
“We really have positive energy as a team, and we just race, and the momentum built from the medley relay, and it was really exciting when we won that. We weren’t expected to win that, and it just built,” said McLaughlin. “Evan Hoaglund is an amazing sprinter and the 100 Breast is probably his fourth best stroke and he broke a minute with 59 (seconds), got second place, and that was really, really amazing.”
Westford Academy stalled the Wildcats’ stampede in the final relay as Chris Fahlman, Han Park, Doug Caggiano, and Aiden Gouldson won the 400 Free Relay posting a time of 3:17.47 to qualify for states next week and steal the relay sweep from Weston.
“This meet is probably the hardest in the state to win between D1 and D2 — there are so many good teams here. Sometimes you come to a meet like this, you are happy to be top six or seven so for us to come in and win is awesome,” said McLaughlin.
Weston now packs up the gear and heads to the Div. 2 state championships where they are two-time defending champions and hold an amazing 27 state titles throughout the history of the program. McLaughlin is hoping the momentum continues this season.
“There are some good teams in that meet, so I hope so. We are going to swim our butts off again to get ready, but we have some good competition there,” said McLaughlin.