Swimmers have a last chance to qualify

Sonja Karp
NLJ Sports Reporter
 
After giving all they had last weekend at the 3A East Conference Meet, the Lady Dogies struggled to recover last week as they prepared for their Last Chance meet in Gillette on Thursday.
“We really did well at Conference, so everyone was really tired and sore, and didn’t have a lot of energy last week in practice,” head coach Doug Scribner admitted. “I wasn’t really worried, but I honestly didn’t know how the meet was going to go.”
In the first couple of events on Thursday, it was evident that the Lady Dogies were lacking a little spark as times were coming in that were definitely off the swimmer’s best in the 200 and 50 Free races. The exception was with Kyah Miller who cut nearly two seconds off her 50 Free, which in a race that short, is quite a feat. 
“It took a couple of events for the girls to get going,” Scribner began. “I was excited to see Kyah do so well in the 50, however. We’ve been working on that race with her, so she went from a solid 40 seconds last week at Conference, to just a little over 38 seconds this week so it was great to see that improvement.”
Swimmers then got a mid-meet break as the diving commenced. The only diver for the Lady Dogies was Dakotta Wheeler, and though her warmup was a little rough, after hitting her first couple of dives, the freshman went on to mark her highest score to date in the six dive format. 
“Dakotta just really improved a ton,” Scribner exclaimed. “Her best performance this season for six dives was a 109, and she made an improvement of 26 points so that was awesome.”
Wheeler’s performance seemed to serve to light the fuse on the Lady Dogies’ energy level as they went on to make improvements almost exclusively across the board for the rest of the meet.
“In the 100 Free, we started to see the girls pick it up a notch,” Scribner nodded. “Mo [Moriahn Kenney] shaved nearly three seconds off her best time, while Dakotta took over two seconds off of hers.”
Raeleigh Shipp also had a great showing in the 100 Breaststroke, taking off almost five seconds from her best time, while Miller cut nearly three seconds from hers.
“At Conference I noticed that Raeleigh was really starting to look like a breaststroker,” Scribner shared. “Her form and technique looked really good and she was really strong. On Thursday, she really attacked this race and looked great while doing it.”
The Lady Dogies were missing a couple of swimmers so Scribner did not enter a team in either the 200 Medley or the 200 Free relays. However, he opted to put two teams in the 400 Free. Since they only had seven members of the squad on hand, he “borrowed” a swimmer from Thunder Basin to fill out one of the teams so they swam as exhibition only. 
Unbeknownst to Scribner, the girls had schemed and come up with a plan to make this final relay a memorable one. 
“A freestyle relay means you are allowed to swim any stroke you wish in your leg of the race,” Scribner explained. “Usually, that means you actually swim the Freestyle stroke, however that is not a requirement. So, the girls on both teams decided they would do an IM for 75 yards and dog paddle the remaining 25.”
Given that all relays get to compete at state, the stakes weren’t high regarding how they finished. The girls wanted to make it fun, and succeeded in that goal.
“It was pretty fun, and the girls were really happy and excited about it after the race,” Scribner chuckled. “I was actually
really impressed with Lydia [Anderson]. She swam nearly as fast as Hannah [Gross] did on her leg.” 
“At the end of the meet, as a group and as individuals, I told them that I was really happy to see them end like that because this is the first time I’d seen them smile and laugh all week,” Scribner continued. “It was good to see them jazzed up and excited to swim again.”
Scribner is hoping to see that excitement continue into this weekend as his team heads to the State Meet in Gillette this Thursday and Friday. Gross and Becca Henkle are the team’s only two individual qualifiers, in swimming and diving respectively. Since Gross has qualified in every event, she will have to choose which two she wants to race and as of Monday afternoon, Scribner was pretty certain she would choose the 200 Free and the 100 Backstroke.
“I’m not completely sure, but I think she’s going to go with those two events,” he began. “After coming off her performance in the backstroke in Conference, she was pretty excited so I think that’s what she’ll choose. Becca will dive and then we’ll mix the girls up in the relays. I will be able to shift people around from prelims to finals since only Becca and Hannah will have individual events to factor in.”
On Thursday, diving starts at 2:00 with the first eight dives and then swimming prelims will take place. On Friday, it will be the regular championship meet with swimming to begin at 10 and the  remaining three dives will take place in the middle.