Fallon's Nathan Narag swims in the 200-meter freestyle Saturday in the regional championships in Carson City.
If the Greenwave swim team wasn’t already considered as notable as other Churchill County High School teams after sending last year, people won’t likely forget this season when the team sent more than half its team to state.
The boys and girls swim teams had a challenging two days Friday and Saturday in Carson City in the regional championships. The boys team finished fifth of eight teams with 217 points, and the girls team finished second of eighth with 232 behind Truckee at 373.
The state championship meet will be held at the University of Las Vegas’ Buchanan Natatorium on Saturday beginning at 11:45 a.m.
Individually for the Wave boys’ team, Charlie Brown and Isaac Kelsey each took fourth in the 100-yard breaststroke and the 50-yard freestyle respectively and the team of Brown, Kelsey, Kendall Rogers, Nathan Narag will be headed to Las Vegas after taking fourth in the 200-yard medley relay.
Fallon coach Ken Grimes said he was proud of all his swimmers in this meet, and especially since the boys all dropped time in their spots for the relay and improving overall.
“Isaac was 6th going into prelims but was able to drop time in the 50 free each time he swam it and was able to earn that 4th spot,” Grimes said of Kelsey’s time (25.56). “Charlie Brown was also seeded below the top 4 in the breast stroke and was able to advance (1:20.02). While not making an individual berth to state, Kendall Rogers, Nathan Narag and Brian Seline made significant drops to move into finals and score points as well as help advance our relay team. We have seen steady improvement throughout the season with all our young men and now it’s paying off.”
Equally impressive, the girls team qualified four individuals and three relay teams for the Las Vegas competition. Katalina Martinez qualified in two individual events, taking third in the 100-yard freestyle (1:02.65) and fourth in the 50-yard freestyle (28.24). Amber Revels and Kaelehn Nemeth also qualified at fourth in the 100-yard butterfly (1:21.30) and third in the 100-yard backstroke (1:12.08) respectively to head to state.
Senior Danielle Brown led the foursome of herself, Nemeth, Revels and Martinez to fourth in the 200-yard medley relay with a time of 2:15.52. Sierra Bivens also qualified alongside Nemeth, Revels and Martinez at third place in the 200-yard freestyle relay (1:56.59). Brown and Bivens also qualified with Addyson Harmon and Madison Tiede taking fourth in the 400-yard freestyle relay (4:54.48) to round out the relay teams headed to state.
“The girls team really came through,” Grimes said. “We had several girls pull off upsets that got them into finals and scored points for us. That was a huge factor in our overall score. Kaelehn, Katalina, and Amber were able to drop the time needed to earn their spots in individual events and the girls all dropped their split time in their relay events.”
Grimes added he thinks his swimmers showed a consistent effort in pushing each other all season, working together and learning from one another.
“Our seniors, Addyson Harmon, Sierra Bivens, Danielle Brown and Nathan Narag have been great mentors for our team,” Grimes said. “They are competitive and have great team spirit. We are very excited going forward.”