Both Franklin swimming and diving coach Zach DeWitt and his Center Grove counterpart, Jim Todd, marveled at how quickly Thursday night’s boys dual meet went, with both calling it the shortest they could recall.
Less than an hour after the proceedings began, the host Grizzly Cubs were huddled on the deck celebrating a 112-71 victory against their county rivals.
Though the rapid-fire pace of the meet may have impacted the swimmers’ times to some extent, it wasn’t a completely foreign experience to them.
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Click here to purchase photos from this gallery“It’s just like practice,” Franklin’s Jacob Destrampe said. “In practice, we just rep things out. We don’t get 10 minutes between each swim in practice.”
Franklin pulled out to a quick lead with a 1-2 finish in the opening 200-yard medley relay. The team of Griffin Edwards, Brock Lock, Max Kramer and Aiden McCain picked up the victory. Destrampe and Michael Couet followed with first-place finishes in the 200 freestyle and 200 individual medley, respectively, and when Kramer added a win in the 50 freestyle, the Grizzly Cubs had a comfortable cushion that held up throughout.
The highlight of the night came next in 1-meter diving, where Franklin’s Gauge Creech set a new pool record with his score of 279.38.
“He’s probably one of the most daring individuals I’ve ever met,” DeWitt said of Creech, “so leave it up to him to go and pop off something impressive like that at a meet like this. That’s just the kind of guy he is; he can bring it on any particular night.”
Destrampe and Lock followed with wins in the 100 butterfly and 100 free, respectively, before Center Grove got its first victory of the night from Brady Ferguson in the 500 freestyle.
In the 200 free relay, Destrampe joined Aiden McCain, Couet and Chance Gildersleave on the winning team. Griffin Edwards won the 100 backstroke and Couet took the 100 breaststroke for Franklin’s final victories of the day.
The Trojans took the 400 freestyle relay behind the quartet of Ethan Beaumont, Tony Gipson, Noah Tallman and Alex Feitl.
Despite the loss, Todd was pleased with how his Trojans performed.
“I just wanted to see how tough they were,” he said. “because it’s the first time doing a meet without the girls, and it’s that fast, 51 minutes, and they held up pretty good.”
DeWitt, likewise, is pleased with where his team is at this point in the year.
“This is the most team growth I’ve ever seen from the beginning to this point in the season,” DeWitt said. “I’ll be very interested to see how that continues to pan out, but we have very mature leaders this year.
“Our mentality in meets is phenomenal. We have a lot of guys that swim with chips on their shoulder, so it’s just been nice to watch.”
