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Surge Toward State Begins

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By MATTHEW POSTINS, Tribune correspondent

Published: October 15, 2007

The march toward the FHSAA state swimming and diving championships begins this week with five district meets involving Hillsborough County teams.

Teams in Class 1A-District 7 start with diving today and swimming preliminaries and finals Tuesday at Berkeley Prep.

That meet should be one of the area's most competitive. Berkeley Prep's Jonathan Jordan carries the top time in the county in the 200-yard freestyle entering the meet at 1:42.25. The Jesuit pair of Vinny Donnelly and Andrew Werdine carry top-four times in six events into district, not including their work on Jesuit's 400 free relay, which has the area's second-best time.

Junior Grace Fredlake anchors a Tampa Prep girls team that hopes it can challenge Berkeley Prep and Academy of the Holy Names. AHN has top-four times in two of the three relay events.

Two of the area's best teams - Sickles and Wharton - swim Thursday and Friday. Sickles travels to the Palm Harbor YMCA for the 3A-5 meet, along with Alonso. Sickles finished in the top two on both the boys and girls side in the City Relays and have several swimmers with state aspirations, including boys medley hopeful Conor Swanson and the girls relay team of Veronica Case, Katie Cook, Katie Westbrook and Carie Foster.

The 3A-2 meet begins at Copeland Pool in Tampa on Tuesday with diving events. Swimming preliminaries begin at 9 a.m. Thursday at Bobby Hicks Pool in Tampa. Among the boys, Bloomingdale, Durant, East Bay, Gaither and Wharton all have swimmers who have top-10 times this season, making the team favorite hard to judge. On the girls side, with top-10 times in nearly every event, Wharton appears deep enough to be considered a favorite to win the team title.

Newsome, which swept the City Relays, will swim at the 2A-7 meet in Sebring, along with Armwood and Brandon. The Wolves, with one of the area's deepest teams, are considered a favorite to win. The Newsome boys and girls have not lost a dual meet this season.

The 2A-8 meet completes the week's action, with diving at New Tampa YMCA on Friday and swimming at Copeland Pool on Saturday. The meet includes nine Hillsborough County schools, but there is no clear favorite in what appears to be a balanced field.

The winner of each event during district competition is guaranteed a berth in the region meet.

The rest of the field is determined by the next overall times at large from the other districts in a region for a field of 24 in individual events and a field of 16 in relays.

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