Ladies get feet wet

Sonja Karp
NLJ Sports Reporter
 
The Lady Dogies swim team is returning only one state qualifier from last year’s squad, six of the nine members are freshmen and there is not a senior on the roster. Head coach Doug Scribner admitted that his team is young, however they are far from inexperienced.
Even though we have so many young kids, that doesn’t mean they are new to the pool,” Scribner began. “Most of them have been swimming in club, and several did so pretty consistently over the summer, so they are a little ahead of the game to start the season.”
Junior Hannah Gross returns as the Lady Dogies’ top performer, having qualified for the state meet in every event last year. Gross placed second in that meet in both the 100 Freestyle and the 100 Backstroke and is looking to improve that performance this year. Gross was also one who swam over the course of the summer and competed in Zones in Fresno, CA at the beginning of August as well.
“In order to qualify, she had to achieve a zone time which is a little faster than our state qualifying time,” Scribner explained. “Hannah had some pretty good time drops in the Free and the Backstroke which are her strengths, and she’s wanting to work on her sprinting and is excited for that.”
Junior Becca Henkle and sophomore Autumn Mills are the other returning swimmers for the team. Henkle’s strengths lie in the Freestyle and the Butterfly, the latter of which Scribner noted is her favorite. 
Scribner also identified the Freestyle as one of Mills’ strongest strokes and included the Breaststroke among her repertoire as well. 
New to the squad this year are freshmen Lydia Anderson (Freestyle and Breaststroke), Moriahn Kenney (Freestyle), Raylee Shipp (Breaststroke and Freestyle), Brylee Toth (Freestyle), Dakotta Wheeler (Freestyle), and Kyah Miller (Diving). 
With each of the four strokes among the wheelhouse of at least one member of the team, the Lady Dogies are looking good to put together a strong Medley Relay, and to be able to put at least one contender in each race which will be beneficial to the overall team score at meets throughout the season.
In addition, after going without a diver last year, the squad has four members hitting the board this season. Henkle is returning after taking a year off, and will be joined by Toth, Miller and Wheeler as well.
“It’s exciting to have divers again, and Becca should qualify,” Scribner predicted. “She has talent and experience, and Hannah [Cummings] says all the divers look pretty good, it’s just a matter of learning the dives.”
Cummings returned to the coaching staff this season due to the diving contingent, and also returning to help is Teresa Gross.
This Friday and Saturday, the Lady Dogies will dive into what Scribner described as the toughest season schedule his team has seen in quite some time.
“It’s the fullest and the longest we’ve had, and we get to swim against Lander and Sublette — two of the strongest teams in the conference — right off the bat,” he exclaimed. “We will travel to Cody for back-to-back weekends of some fierce competition, and will face off against 4A teams in Sheridan as well.”
This weekend the team will travel to Lander for a relay meet on Friday, followed by a Pentathlon meet on Saturday.