Boys’ Swimming Steals a Deerfield Win
Boys’ swimming came out on top this past Saturday, defeating Deerfield 93-90 in a nail-biting win decided by the last event. The victory brought the boys’ record to 2-2, a solid showing after facing some tough opponents early on in the season.
Coming off a dominant win against Milton, the boys were eager to see how they stacked up against their green rivals, although they knew the competition would be fierce. “The mindset going into the meet was just to put our best effort out there and get some best times, but not necessarily to beat Deerfield, because we hadn't beaten them in recent memory,” upper Graham Hazlett said.
However, after crushing Deerfield in the first event, the 200 medley relay, the boys jumped on the opportunity to go after the win. “As soon as we won the first relay, we carried that momentum with us throughout the meet,” lower Joel Lotzkar said.
The rest of the meet was stacked with stellar performances, with Hazlett racking up valuable points by winning the 50 freestyle in 22.30 and the 100 backstroke in 54.13. Senior Robert Conner and lower Tavo Santos also played important roles at the meet, placing first and second in the Boys’ 1 meter diving event, respectively. In virtually every event there was at least one Exeter athlete in the top three, including many second and third place finishes from the team.
In addition to these impressive individual performances, the freestyle relays stood testament to Exeter’s superior depth and speed. “I think our success against Deerfield came through our relay wins during the second half of the meet,” upper David Shepley said.
Shepley out-touched Deerfield by .06 seconds as the anchor of the Boys 200 freestyle relay, following fast legs from uppers Will Belmont, Thomas Gallup and Ernesto Brown. The 400 freestyle relay team of seniors Andrew Eigner and Brooks Saltonstall, as well as Hazlett and Shepley, held off a deep Deerfield team to secure the win for Exeter.
Hazlett attributed Exeter’s stunning victory to the team’s attitude going into their swims. “I really saw a strength in the level of enthusiasm the team had as the meet went on. By the time diving started, we were nearly tied with Deerfield, and after a few more great races, I could see that the whole team was really motivated to swim fast.”
As it is still mid-season, Big Red will train through the next few meets before tapering for Interschols in early March. “We’re just going to get back into the grind, train some long practices and build more strength and technique to perform even better,” Hazlett said.