YOUR AD HERE »

Swimming lands ‘huge’ 2nd place in league relays

Janice Kurbjun
summit daily news

Excitement resounded in Summit swim coach Jenny Wischmeyer’s voice when she spoke of the Tigers’ second-place finish in Saturday’s league relay meet.

It was the first time Summit swam against its new Western Slope competition.

“It’s huge for us. We never go to any meet and finish second,” she said, later adding, “I don’t think we finished above seventh in the JeffCo league in 12 years. … I hope it bodes well for the season. It would be awesome to finish in the top 4, even the top 3 in the league meet. … I guess it’s just the league relay meet, so we don’t really know, but it’s kind of a good sign.”



Another good sign is Summit’s 200-yard freestyle relay team taking third place with a time of 1 minute, 59 seconds Saturday. That beats Tuesday’s time of 2:01, however, there’s still a lot of improvement to be had; last year’s relay, which nearly qualified for state, swam a time of 1:51.5, just a half-second short of the qualifying time of 1:51.00.

Three of the relay’s swimmers return – Megan Hogfeldt, Kitt Maxwell and Olya Aden – and are joined by team captain Evans this year.



Another highlight was the 200-yard backstroke relay, which consisted of Maddy O’Malley, Megan Hogfeldt, Kitt Maxwell and Lisa Evans as anchor. The relay finished third as well, in a time of 2:24.63. Several other relays had fifth-, sixth- and seventh-place finishes.

Divers Abby Akers and Molly Sharr finished third in the relay meet while Rayna Marcias and Kimberly Coffin placed fourth.

In Friday’s face-off between Summit and Aspen on the ice, Aspen found itself behind early in the first period, 1-0, but gained momentum to take the win, 5-1.

“Again, we were right there with them for the majority of the game, then things got a little out of control and a little chippy and we were unable to convert on some power play opps we had,” head coach Chris Ruhly said. “Again, there’s some teaching and learning that needs to be taken care of. We open up conference play next weekend, so we’ve got a lot of work to do between now and then.”

George Kasch opened up the game with a goal assisted by Peter Grotemeyer, but Aspen answered with two more goals in the first period, followed by two in the second and one in the third. Aspen’s Jack Doremus sunk two of those goals, with other teammates spreading out the rest of the scoring.

Summit’s Wyatt Dickerson tended goal, taking 38 shots and making 33 saves. Alex Parrish of Aspen fielded 22 shots and 21 saves, with Evan Morris in goal for a portion of the game. The team is now 1-4 on the season.

In a meet full of strong wrestling teams, Summit emerged from the Wheat Ridge Invitational with three wrestlers placing.

Carlos Lopez placed fourth in the 106-pound class, Bryan Daniel took third in the 113-pound class and Nick Wittrock finished second at 126.

“It was a hard tournament. There were good schools there. We don’t go to any easy meets. They got to wrestle some tough competitors and they wrestled really good,” head coach Pete Baker said.

Any losses were from minor mistakes that come from being new to wrestling, the coach added.

Most of his weight classes were filled in Saturday’s meet, with some doubling up in the lighter classes and a few wrestlers out sick or with injury and just two missing due to ineligibility. Eleven wrestlers traveled to Wheat Ridge.

“The highlight was the way Nick wrestled. He wrestled really well – and Bryan lost the first round to a kid from Arvada and came back to beat that kid for third place,” Baker said, adding that sophomore Daniel Lopez, in his first year of wrestling, won a few of his matches at Saturday’s meet.

The Summit boys’ basketball team attended the Skyline Tournament Friday and Saturday, facing Thornton the first night and Eaglewood on Saturday afternoon.

The team lost to Thornton, 64-54, with sophomore Thomas DeBonnville tallying 21 points as the team’s scoring leader. He racked up five 2-pointers, three 3-pointers and was two of four from the line. Senior Coy Coker was the second leading scorer with 13 points comprised of three 2-pointers and two 3-pointers. DeBonnville had six steals and two assists while Coker had three steals and six assists.

“It was a good close game most of the night,” head coach Phil Tronsrue said. “They ended up pulling away late in the fourth quarter, because we had missed some shots and we had to foul and they stepped to the line and made their free throws.”

The team faced off with Eaglewood Saturday, but the night ended at the hospital after a player was kneed in the head to cause a concussion, delaying the coach’s response.


Support Local Journalism

Support Local Journalism

As a Summit Daily News reader, you make our work possible.

Summit Daily is embarking on a multiyear project to digitize its archives going back to 1989 and make them available to the public in partnership with the Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection. The full project is expected to cost about $165,000. All donations made in 2023 will go directly toward this project.

Every contribution, no matter the size, will make a difference.