Beek leads Bobcats to second place

A strong finish for MHS, including individual gold for Adele Beek, pushed the Bobcats into second out of seven teams at the MHS pool.

MHS scored 221 points, three ahead of Linn-Mar in third. Johnston won the team title with 331 points.

“I’ll take it,” MHS head coach Angie Nelson said. “We had the girls in the events where we see them performing the best and wanting to get some better times and a time-seeded meet was perfect for that since you know what everybody around you has and then it’s just a choice of desire to go for it.”

Beek was the lone champion for the Bobcats on Saturday, winning the 100-yard breaststroke in 1:13.64, less than a second ahead of Linn-Mar’s Layla Breitbach.

T-R PHOTO BY JAKE RYDER – Marshalltown junior Maisie Gummert makes her way through the water in the 500-yard freestyle during Saturday’s Bobcat Invite in the MHS pool. Gummert took second in 5 minutes, 48.07 seconds.

That win got MHS within a single point of Linn-Mar in the team standings heading to the final event, and MHS overtook the Lions with a third-place finish in the 400 freestyle relay, two spots better than Linn-Mar in the event.

“She was absolutely fantastic,” Nelson said of Beek. “She’s gone from 1:16 to 1:15 and now this 1:13, that’s great. She’s a determined young lady and was really driving off the block well and off the turn. It was a really nice race for her. It’s always nice to be pushed too, because she’s got the talent, drive and desire. We’re gonna see some great things from her.”

She was one of several Bobcats seeing time drops on Saturday, with Nelson pointing out faster times for Libby Meyer in her leg of the 200 freestyle relay and Rachel Case and Morgan Bear dropping time in the breaststroke.

“I thought our backstrokers weren’t as strong as they could’ve been today, but sometimes with those extra breaks in the meet the flow can just be different from a regular meet,” Nelson said.

Leia Hernandez was the runner-up in the 50 freestyle, 31-thousandths of a second behind Johnston’s Faith Franum. Franum is among the state leaders in the 500 freestyle but competed in short-distance freestyle events on Saturday.

“Sometimes changing events is good for perspective,” Nelson said. “We’ll do that this week and run things differently versus Ames than we would Indianola.”

In the diving portion of Saturday’s event, Kate Hauser scored 416.65 in her first 11-meet dive of the season to take second overall.

Grinnell’s Camryn Russell, the current state leader in 11-dive and a fifth-place finisher at last year’s state meet, won with a 485.70.

Hauser’s 416.65 is a new personal best and comes after a less-than-desirable score on an early dive that Nelson said had her working from behind most of the meet.

“The first meet’s always the worst one,” Nelson added. “But she did a really good job and is just continuing to work on two of those big twisters in her dive list where the big money scores come from. She’s got a lot of potential and a lot of the fixes are easy fixes.”

Hauser introduced a forward two-and-a-half somersault into her routine on Saturday for the first time, and also recently started with her back approaches in her diving list to help her build confidence for later in her dives.

“I may start with my inwards next time though,” Hauser said. “It was good to see a PR, but also know that I can still improve. It was a really solid meet.”

Marshalltown has two more home meets on tap this week: Tuesday against Ames and Thursday against Indianola.

Bobcat Swim & Dive Invite

At Marshalltown

Team Standings — 1. Johnston 331, 2. Marshalltown 221, 3. Linn-Mar 218, 4. Lewis Central 197, 5. Grinnell 179, 6. Atlantic 54, 7. Ottumwa 36.

EVENT RESULTS

(Champions and MHS placewinners)

DIVING — 1. Camryn Russell, GRIN, 485.70; 2. Kate Hauser, MHS, 416.65.

200 MEDLEY RELAY — 1. Linn-Mar (Breitbach, Carstensen, Raghwani, Luck), 1:58.07; 3. MHS (Ceren, Beek, E. Case, R. Case), 2:02.22.

200 FREESTYLE — 1. Rio Hammitt, LC, 2:01.89; 5. Maisie Gummert, MHS, 2:12.81; 11. Drea Ceren, MHS, 2:19.19.

200 INDIVIDUAL MEDLEY — 1. Maura Carstensen, L-M, 2:20.10; 6. Emma Case, MHS, 2:31.10; 7. Adele Beek, MHS, 2:31.69.

50 FREESTYLE — 1. Faith Frantum, JOHN, 25.60; 2. Leia Hernandez, MHS, 25.91; 5. Rachel Case, MHS, 27.36; 8. Libby Meyer, MHS, 28.06.

100 BUTTERFLY — 1. Josie Smith, GRIN, 1:01.92; 6. E. Case, MHS, 1:08.20; 10. Alex Lasack, MHS, 1:14.27.

100 FREESTYLE — 1. Frantum, JOHN, 55.06; 3. Hernandez, MHS, 57.55; 9. Meyer, MHS, 1:02.77.

500 FREESTYLE — 1. Kyliee Zylstra, GRIN, 5:34.89; 2. Gummert, MHS, 5:48.07.

200 FREESTYLE RELAY — 1. Johnston (Molis, Assaad, Loo, Frantum), 1:45.78; 3. MHS (Hernandez, Meyer, Gummert, R. Case), 1:47.88.

100 BACKSTROKE — 1. Sarah Assaad, JOHN, 1:04.09; 6. Lasack, MHS 1:15.01; 7. Ceren, MHS, 1:15.32.

100 BREASTSTROKE — 1. Beek, MHS, 1:13.64; 7. Rachel Case, MHS, 1:18.17.

400 FREESTYLE RELAY — 1. Grinnell (Zylstra, Sieck, Kenkel, Smith), 3:55.34; 3. MHS (E. Case, Ceren, Gummert, Hernandez), 4:03.42.