Swimmers win 4th straight Kennedy title

Kendall Novak (photo by Jim Lindquist)

Maybe Bloomington Kennedy officials should just mail out the Eagle Invitational championship trophy to FHS at the start of each season. The Tigers taking home the hardware from the meet has become about as routine as snow in January.

Farmington ran away with the team title for the fourth straight year at Saturday's annual get-together in Bloomington and this time it wasn't even close.

Farmington's speed, talent and depth combined to score 811 team points, well ahead of runner-up Bloomington Jefferson who finished.at 601. Red Wing totaled 399, Eau Claire (Wis.) North 307 and host Kennedy 170.

The multi-team meet win was the third in as many tries for the Tigers who also own a perfect 4-0 dual meet record this season.

"Saturday marked our fifth meet in ten days," coach Jen Marshall said. "Needless to say the girls are swimming tired. The amazing part of it is they're still swimming fast. That should make for some great performances come taper time."

The Tigers dominance showed on the results page which had them winning seven of the 12 events outright and scoring eight second place finishes.

The trio of Kaitlyn O'Reilly, Cora Ruzicka and Kirsten Kracke combined for six individual first place efforts. O'Reilly won the 100 individual medley and 100 breaststroke. Ruzicka led the field in the 200 and 500 freestyle and Kracke ruled in the 50 and 100 freestyle.

The other Farmington first came from the 200 freestyle quartet of O'Reilly, Kracke, Chelsea Gehrke, and Ellie Sundet.

Catherine Gehrke (photo by Jim Lindquist)

Six of the eight runner-up finishes came in individual events: Chelsea Gehrke, 200 medley and 100 butterfly; Catherine Gehrke, 200 freestyle; Kendall Novak, diving; Sara Kintner, 500 freestyle and Emily Ley, 100 backstroke.

The 200 medley relay team of Kracke, O'Reilly, and the Gehrke sisters and the 400 freestyle foursome of Sundet, Catherine Gehrke, Ley and Ruzicka each scored second place points.

The champions also turned in four third place finishes, including Sundet in the 200 freestyle: Nikki Cayard in diving; Grace Roach in the 100 butterfly and Catherine Gehrke in the 500 freestyle.

The Tigers have two dual meets on their plate this week, a Tuesday home encounter with Minneapolis Southwest and a Missota Conference match-up at Chaska on Thursday.