Neuqua Valley makes it four straight at West Chicago invite
The Neuqua Valley boys swimming team won Saturday's Wildcat Relays at West Chicago. It's a meet that has been good to the Wildcats over the years, really good.
It was Neuqua's fourth straight team title at the competition, and since 1999 the Wildcats have won the meet 15 times.
In the latest edition of the 10-team battle, the Wildcats scored 167 points. Waubonsie Valley was second at 132 and Glenbard West-South co-op finished third with 122.
For most of the teams, including Neuqua and Waubonsie, it's the first Saturday invitational of the season.
"You get to see a lot of competition and see the relays for how they perform early in the season," said Neuqua coach Chad Allen.
Of the 11 relays in the meet, the Wildcats won eight of them. The three relays usually competed for in state competition were part of the meet along with relays special just to this competition.
The Neuqua 800-yard freestyle relay provided the biggest highlight for the Wildcats of the meet, trailing at one point in the race. However, Brandon Chelstrom, Jack Hiss, Preston Waldusky and Jacob Cunningham came back to finish in 7 minutes, 29.64, with Lockport in second at 7:36.27.
"We had some idea of what we had with them. I thought they would come back and win it," Allen said of the 800 squad.
The Wildcats began the day with a victory in the 200 medley relay. Michael Blackledge, Cameron Casey, Tanner Schrey and Chelstrom clocked a 1:44.52.
Other Neuqua victories were: the freshman/sophomore 200 medley relay of Sathya Subramanian, Rohan Nagori, Nate Cobb and Tanner Schrey with a time of 1:44.91; the 200 freestyle relay of Cunningham, Kyri Chen, Schrey and John Ruan that prevailed in 1:28.89; the 200 butterfly relay of Subramanian, Waldusky, Cobb and Blackledge that touched the wall at 1:41.96; and the 200 backstroke relay of Chen, Ruan, Chelstrom and Blackledge, who earned a 1:38.45.
The Wildcats finished the meet with a win in the frosh/soph 200 freestyle relay thanks to Hiss, Cobb, Schrey and Subramanian's 1:32.62, and the 400 freestyle relay of Cunningham, Ruan, Chen and Hiss won in 3:17.22.
"We have the freestyle relays. But we had a chance to see how everyone does in the backstroke, butterfly and breaststroke," Allen said.
Waubonsie won two relays. The 400 medley relay of Eric Weng, Jake Darlinger, Ryan Ruhde and Jared Simpson earned the top spot in 3:45.88 and the 200 breaststroke relay of Sam Hurdle, Joshua Ceh, Weng and Simpson prevailed in 1:58.44.
"I was pleased with seeing how people stepped up," said Waubonsie coach Nick Arens. "There were a lot of kids in untraditional roles. It's a fun meet and we go out and compete."
Glenbard West-South earned three second-place finishes - the 200 medley relay of John Kilinski, Sean Lapano, Sean Maloney and Timo Curtis; the 200 frosh/soph medley relay of Gage Ridinger, Colin Janis, Nick Andres and Ian Holm; and the 200 freestyle relay of Lapano, Jack Schoenfeld, Curtis and Kilinski.