Submitted by Chase McFadden:
Swimming doesn’t award style points.
If it did, several of Lander Valley’s victories at the Wyoming 3A State Swimming and Diving Championships would have scored off the charts.
The Tigers won nine of twelve events in claiming the school’s 23rd straight title, but the quality of those swims isn’t reflected in the team’s 286 points.
LVHS swimmers earned one All-American time and three All-American Consideration times. Eight school records, five 3A state records — three of which are faster than the corresponding 4A marks — and three Gillette pool records were broken. Throw in a whole mess of personal bests, and what you come up with is a state championship for the ages.
Lander’s diving duo got the team off to a strong start at the beginning of Friday evening’s prelims. Junior Preston Plaisted — the 3A ranks’ top diver throughout the season — scored 163.65 points over eight dives to take the top spot, while senior Dominic Tejada tallied a solid 185.35 points to secure eighth.
Friday’s first preliminary event contested between the lane lines set the tone for LVHS’s record-setting weekend. The 200 yard medley relay team of Jonny Kulow, Caleb Huelskamp, Ryan Brinda and Nick Kulow raced to a 1:34.45, smashing the state record by four seconds and qualifying as an All-American Consideration time.
After anchoring the relay, Nick Kulow stepped back onto the blocks and qualified first in the 200 yard freestyle with a school record time of 1:44.25. Junior T Whiting and sophomore Colton Wietzki also punched tickets for Saturday’s “A” final with the 5th and 6th fastest qualifying swims in the 200.
Freshman Jonny Kulow touched at 1:56.29 in the 200 yard IM, a full ten seconds ahead of the second place qualifier. Fellow frosh Ross Anderson qualified 10th — cutting nine seconds from his personal best in the process — just ahead of sophomore Benaiah Dolence who took 11th.
Next up was the 50 yard freestyle, where the fastest time went to the senior Huelskamp in 21.43 seconds. Senior Bob Blunck clocked a 25.37, a half second faster than his seed time, good for 15th place.
The prelim of the 100 yard butterfly foreshadowed an exciting Saturday final that would turn out to be the most closely-contested race of the weekend. Lander junior Brinda grabbed the top spot in 53.50, while Blunck bested his season’s best by four seconds, qualifying eighth.
Jonny Kulow qualified tops in the 100 yard freestyle, with freshman Nolan McFadden placing third. Whiting filled the 10th slot with a 53.04.
The 500 yard freestyle saw Nick Kulow follow up his younger brother’s 100 yard showing with another top qualifier swim, slicing off nearly 15 seconds from his entry mark. However, the junior’s time drop wasn’t the largest by a Tiger in the event. Freshman Ramsey Eckhardt — who narrowly qualified for state with his gutsy swim at the conference meet — pulled and kicked to a 6:02.39, twenty seconds faster than his time two weeks earlier. Frosh Elijah Applegate cut 11 seconds and finished 16th, two spots behind Eckhardt.
Up next, the 200 yard freestyle relay team of McFadden, Dolence, Plaisted and Whiting touched the wall just seven-tenths behind top-qualifier Rawlins.
Brinda claimed second in the 100 backstroke prelim with teammate McFadden close behind for third. Plaisted cut over four seconds from his seed time to qualify fifth, and Dolence raced to a 12th place finish.
Huelskamp bettered his own state record in the 100 yard breaststroke with a 56.48 to take his second top-qualifier spot. Anderson swam to 15th by cutting over five seconds from his best, and junior Mason Kinney touched in 17th, dropping almost six seconds from his seed time.
The 400 yard freestyle relay team of Jonny Kulow, Brinda, Nick Kulow and Huelskamp torched the field, finishing in 3:09.42, an All-American Consideration time. The foursome had set a state record in the event at the Bruce Gresly Invitational in January with a 3:14.06.
Saturday morning’s finals picked up right where Friday’s prelims left off with record-breaking swims by the Tigers. In the 200 medley relay, Jonny Kulow led off in the backstroke and touched the wall first, passing it on to Huelskamp for the breast. The lead continued to swell, with Brinda handling the fly and Nick Kulow bringing it home with the free and touching in 1:34.05, a half-second faster than the quad’s effort in the prelims.
Lander swimmers occupied three of the six lanes in the 200 freestyle final. Nick Kulow opened up a body length lead over the first 100 and hammered it down over the final four lengths to take the team’s first individual state title. Whiting powered past a Sublette County swimmer in the last 15 yards to pick up a key spot for Lander. The Tigers loaded the podium with Kulow first, Whiting fourth and Wietzki sixth.
Jonny Kulow blistered the field in the 200 IM final, clocking a 1:54.55 to take first by over eight seconds. More significantly, the freshman broke one of the oldest 3A state records. Phil Rehard — the state meet director and longtime Gillette coach — set the mark while swimming for Rawlins in 1996. Fittingly, Rehard awarded the gold medal to Kulow atop the podium. In the 200 IM “B” final, freshman Anderson made a hard charge from the back of the pack during the breaststroke, willing himself to third place in the heat and a ninth place finish. Dolence bumped up one place in the standings to 11th.
Another long-standing record — this one held by Rawlins’ Jake Rehard since 1998 — fell during the 50 free final. Top seed Huelskamp blasted a 20.82, good for another All-American Consideration time.
The finalists in the 1 mtr diving each completed three more dives during Saturday’s finals. Prelim leader Plaisted made his last dive his best dive, scoring a whopping 45.10 points to pad his substantial lead and capture Lander’s first state diving title since 2011. Tejada, who took up diving for the first time at the start of the season, finished a very respectable 9th place.
After five events, LVHS had five state champions, three state records — two held since the late 90s — and two All-American Consideration times.
Next up was the aforementioned 100 yard butterfly final, which turned out to be the hands-down best race of the meet. Top seed Brinda and Lyman’s Carson Walker battled it out every inch of those 100 yards, and at the end it came down to which swimmer’s final stroke best synced with the distance to the wall. All eyes turned to the scoreboard, seeing that Walker had out-touched the classy Lander junior by six-one-hundreths of a second: 54.06 to 54.12. Blunck captured second in the “B” final, as well, placing him 8th in the event overall.
Lander entered the 100 yard free final holding the first and third fastest qual times, and that’s how it played out. The freshman Kulow swam to his third title of the day in a school record 46.43, with McFadden overcoming a poor start and charging back to take third in 50.34. Whiting took another half second off of his prelim time to grab 10th.
Nick Kulow methodically pulled away from the field in the 500 free final to collect his third title of the day, as well, breaking the five minute barrier with a 4:56.71. Wietzki sliced nine more seconds from his prelim time to secure 4th.
Lander swam to a close second in the 200 yard freestyle relay, but unfortunately the Tigers were disqualified for what proved to be a mistaken call involving an exchange violation.
A quartet of Tigers competed in the 100 back, with Brinda finishing second, McFadden third and Plaisted sixth in the “A” final. Dolence picked up 11th in the “B” final.
The last individual event of the meet — the 100 yard breaststroke — was won with an automatic All-American time of 55.80 for Huelskamp, who one-upped his Friday prelim effort by establishing another new state mark.
So, what could the four Lander swimmers possibly have left for the culminating relay? Plenty, it turns out. The Kulow brothers, Brinda and Huelskamp capped off a historic day with a 3:07.39 in the 400 yard free relay, resetting their own record from Friday evening.
That final record-setting victory was the exclamation point for LVHS’s 23rd consecutive title.
Huelskamp was selected as the Athlete of the Meet, as well as the 3A Athlete of the Year. Shawna Morgan was voted top 3A head coach by her peers, and Faith Hamilton garnered honors as the top assistant coach.
3A State Swim and Dive Championship Meet
Feb. 15-16, 2019
TEAM SCORES: 1. Lander 286, 2. Rawlins 241, 3. Sublette County 148, 4. Powell 137, 5. Lyman 126, 6. Kemmerer 99, 7. Worland 98, 8. Buffalo 89, 9. Riverton 84, 10. Douglas 28, 11. Cody 21, 12. Newcastle 17
PRELIMS
200 Yard Medley Relay: 1. Lander (Jonny Kulow, Caleb Huelskamp, Ryan Brinda, Nick Kulow) 1:34.45
200 Yard Freestyle: 1. Nick Kulow 1:44.25, 5. T Whiting 1:56.81, 6. Colton Wietzki 1:59.40
200 Yard IM: 1. Jonny Kulow 1:56.29, 10. Ross Anderson 2:21.48, 11. Benaiah Dolence 2:23.87
50 Yard Freestyle: 1. Caleb Huelskamp 21.43, 15. Bob Blunck 25.37
Boys 1 mtr Diving: 1. Preston Plaisted 258.15, 8. Dominic Tejada 185.35
100 Yard Butterfly: 1. Ryan Brinda 53.50, 8. Bob Blunck 1:02.53
100 Yard Freestyle: 1. Jonny Kulow 46.82, 3. Nolan McFadden 50.44, 10. T Whiting 53.04
500 Yard Freestyle: 1. Nick Kulow 5:00.45, 4. Colton Wietzki 5:29.06, 14. Ramsey Eckhardt 6:02.39, 16. Elijah Applegate 6:10.12
200 Yard Freestyle Relay: 2. Lander (Nolan McFadden, Benaiah Dolence, Preston Plaisted, T Whiting) 1:34.84
100 Yard Backstroke: 2. Ryan Brinda 55.58, 3. Nolan McFadden 55.73, 5. Preston Plaisted 59.48
100 Yard Breaststroke: 1. Caleb Huelskamp 56.48, 15. Ross Anderson 1:12.00, 17. Mason Kinney 1:13.06
400 Yard Freestyle Relay: 1. Lander (Jonny Kulow, Ryan Brinda, Nick Kulow, Caleb Huelskamp) 3:09.42
FINALS
200 Yard Medley Relay: 1. Lander (Jonny Kulow, Caleb Huelskamp, Ryan Brinda, Nick Kulow) 1:34.05
200 Yard Freestyle: 1. Nick Kulow 1:46.07, 4. T Whiting 1:55.83, 6. Colton Wietzki 2:02.25
200 Yard IM: 1. Jonny Kulow 1:54.55, 9. Ross Anderson 2:19.24, 11. Benaiah Dolence 2:23.88
50 Yard Freestyle: 1. Caleb Huelskamp 20.82
Boys 1 mtr Diving: 1. Preston Plaisted 356.05, 9. Dominic Tejada 260.65
100 Yard Butterfly: 2. Ryan Brinda 54.12, 8. Bob Blunck 1:02.12
100 Yard Freestyle: 1. Jonny Kulow 46.43, 3. Nolan McFadden 50.34, 10. T Whiting 52.55
500 Yard Freestyle: 1. Nick Kulow 4:56.71, 4. Colton Wietzki 5:20.82
200 Yard Freestyle Relay: DQ Lander
100 Yard Backstroke: 2. Ryan Brinda 55.15, 3. Nolan McFadden 56.26, 6. Preston Plaisted 1:00.83, 11. Benaiah Dolence 1:05.10
100 Yard Breaststroke: 1. Caleb Huelskamp 55.80
400 Yard Freestyle Relay: 1. Lander (Jonny Kulow, Ryan Brinda, Nick Kulow, Caleb Huelskamp) 3:07.39