MORGANTOWN — You couldn’t have scripted a better finish to the 2024-25 West Virginia high school swim season than what transpired Friday evening at Peak Health Aquatic Center in Morgantown.
Heading into the final event of the West Virginia Secondary Schools Activities Commission State Swimming Championships, the 400 freestyle relay, four AAA girls teams — John Marshall High School, Bridgeport High School, Fairmont Senior High School and Parkersburg High School — were bunched together, with just a few points separating each squad. Fairmont Senior’s girls swam the consolation finals of the relay, finishing 12th. John Marshall, Bridgeport and Parkersburg’s girls all were in the A final, and how they finished would determine the champion.
Seeded sixth, John Marshall’s squad of Ella Finley, Avery Etzel, Savannah Potts and Maitlyn Miller knew they needed a strong performance to have a chance. The team had already dropped 7 seconds in the 400 relay’s preliminaries earlier in the day just to make the A finals. They turned it on in the last swim, moving up a spot to finish fifth. Bridgeport was second in the event, while Parkersburg was sixth.
In the end, when the points were tallied, John Marshall and Bridgeport finished tied with 115 points to lead the Class AAA girls division. The teams were named co-champions — the only tie in memory for a state swimming championship.
Fairmont Senior finished as runner-up with 113 points while Parkersburg scored 104 points to come in third.
This marked the first year in which the state swimming championship has been broken up between the big schools — Class AAA — and the smaller schools in Class AA/A. That means instead of one team champion for the girls and boys, there would be two crowned, one from each classification. How fitting that in the first year of the new format there would in fact be three team champions crowned for the girls — yet another twist in what has been a strange year for high school athletics in West Virginia.
Yet that twist led the John Marshall girls to earn the school’s first state title in swimming.
“I can’t believe it,” a shocked yet thrilled John Marshall coach Timmi Snyder said of her girls’ state championship. “We were so happy that we brought eight girls here this year and that we were able to coach what we knew was a championship team. These girls did everything that we asked of them. After (Friday) morning’s session when we told them, ‘We’re close, you’ve got to come back and you’ve got to bring your A game’ … they did. They brought their A game. Both our relays (the 200 freestyle relay and the 400 freestyle relay) really stepped up. Sarah Hess and Adah Aubrey, who were in the consolation finals (of the 100 breaststroke and the 100 backstroke, respectively), swam their best races. Every single girl in this second day hit a personal record. I couldn’t be more proud of the effort everyone turned in to help us reach the top.”
Those consolation final finishes — seventh by Aubrey and 11th by Hess — earned valuable points. Without those swims, it would have been a far different outcome for the Lady Monarchs.
The evening’s final events started out with John Marshall’s 200 freestyle relay — which hadn’t lost all year — finishing second to powerhouse Elkins High School (Elkins’ girls won the Class AA/A championship and also were the girls overall best team). Anchored by Miller, who won her first individual state championship in the 50 freestyle on Thursday, the team of Finley, Aubrey and sophomore Zoe Zervos swam a 1:44.43.
Snyder said the second-place finish in the 200 free relay fueled her swimmers to push even hard over the final three events.
“They’ve got what it takes — they’re competitors,” she said. “We were hoping we would keep riding the momentum from OVACs and regionals, and they just kept wanting it. Every time we hit a milestone we set new goals. … My girls are just really hard workers and it shows. I couldn’t be more proud.”
Miller, who also finished third Thursday in the 100 freestyle, closed out a phenomenal high school career not only with an individual and a state title but also by being named to the All-Tournament team.
Boys
A tussle between two swimming powerhouses emerged Friday between Bridgeport High School and George Washington High School as the two teams battled it out nearly until the end to decide the boys’ big school state swimming championships. However, the longer the evening went, the more distance the Indians of Harrison County put on their rivals.
In the end, Bridgeport pulled away from the Kanawha County Patriots and also the rest of the field to capture swimming gold. It marks the boys’ third team title and first since 2019.
The Indians captured two individual titles on Thursday — Owen Guthrie in the 50 freestyle (20.69) and also the 100 freestyle, with a new state record in the 100 at 45.16. On Friday, the team swam to a title in the 200 freestyle relay — also a new state record at 1:27.41 — and then added yet another state record in the 400 freestyle relay with a time of 3:13.72.
Bridgeport captured the boys AAA title while the boys small school award went to Elkins as well. That means aside from John Marshall, Bridgeport won all or a share of both the boys and girls big school title, while Elkins won both the boys and girls in the Class AA/A field.
Local swimmers
Wheeling Park’s Molly George had a strong end to her junior season with a second-place finish in the 100 backstroke, dropping nearly 2 seconds in the finals for a 1:02.16. Brooke High School’s Kiersten Harvath finished fifth in the 100 back at 1:05.37.
Brooke’s 200 free relay team of Harvath, Lindsey Kettler, Lyla Horvath and Faith Farrell finished fifth at 1:48.81. The same foursome finished seventh in the 400 freestyle relay at 3:59.97.
John Marshall junior Wyatt Jefferson finished a solid second in the 100 breaststroke at 1:01.35.
Wheeling Park’s Levi Parker capped his senior season with a fifth-place finish in the 100 backstroke (55.72). The boys 200 freestyle relay of Ronan Maxwell, Brady Beihl, Jacob Walters and Brady Bowie finished 12th. The 400 freestyle relay (Malachi Smith, Walters, Bowie and Parker) finished seventh.
Wheeling Central’s Alex Mihalovich finished eighth in the 500 freestyle (5:10.8) while the Central girls 200 free relay team of Ally Jefferson, Rylee Ondrejko, Gracee Humpee and Ellie Manning finished ninth at 1:53.00.
In team scoring for the boys, Wheeling Park finished eighth in Class AAA. For the girls, Brooke High School finished a solid sixth.
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Publish date : 2025-02-22 05:16:00
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