The excitement in Emporia High girls swimming coach Bob Yevak’s voice told the whole story.
It nearly went without saying that the Lady Spartans swam as well as any team he has ever coached Friday night at the Centennial League championships in Manhattan.
But for good measure — and because he could hardly contain himself — Yevak tried to put into words just how thrilled he was with Emporia’s second-place team finish, which including a one-point finish ahead of perennial league power Manhattan.
“We swam unbelievable,” Yevak said. “That was the best team effort that I have ever been associated with as a coach. It was just awesome.”
To put it into numbers just how well the Lady Spartans swam, consider that of 24 swims on the night, 18 were best times.
In fact, had Emporia had a few more swimmers to enter in more races, Yevak said he believed the Lady Spartans could have beaten league champion Washburn Rural. As it turns out, Rural finished with 471 points, Emporia had 411 while Manhattan finished with 410.
“We out-swam everybody — we were just a few swimmers short,” Yevak said. “Rural won it, but we swam better than they did.”
Emporia High’s divers — Hayley Fry, Alli Armitage and Aubrey Armitage — gave EHS the lead on Thursday when they finished third, fifth and sixth, respectively to give EHS 43 points after just one event.
“The divers are what started us off,” Yevak said. “They put us in the lead (on Thursday), and we couldn’t have done it without their tremendous effort.”
From the way the swimming portion of the league meet started, it was clear the Lady Spartans were onto something big.
In the first of the swimming events, Emporia’s 200-yard medley relay team of Morgan Goad, Caitlin McGuire, Whitney Starr and Jennie Loucks swam its best time of the year when the quartet finished third in a time of 2 minutes, 2.57 seconds.
Hilary Larson then lowered her State-qualifying time in the 200-yard freestyle by nearly 2 seconds in capturing the event title in a time of 2:04.54.
“She was in total control from the start,” Yevak said. “She had a great swim — what a horse.”
Also in the 200-yard free, Cali Schelling dropped 9 seconds off her time to finished eighth (2:20.45).
In the 200-yard individual medley, McGuire took 4 seconds off her best time to produce a fourth-place finish in a time of 2:24.87, with Starr in fifth (2:28.01).
In the 50 free, Kathryn Scherich, Jennie Loucks and Michelle Thompson finished eighth, ninth and 10th, respectively, with Thompson’s time of 28.26 seconds nearly a 2-second drop in time.
Starr produced a State-consideration time in the 100-yard butterfly when she swam a 1:06.53 in the event to place second, while in the 100-yard free McGuire continued her impressive showing with a second-place finish of her own with a time of 58 seconds.
Larson produced her second first-place finish of the day when she dominated the 500-yard freestyle in a time of 5:37.92. Her time improved upon her State-qualifying time from earlier in the year by nearly 6 seconds and was 10 seconds better than the runner-up.
Also of note in the 500-yard free, Schelling dropped a monster 17 seconds off her best time, finishing in eighth in a time of 6:35.55.
Emporia took home a relay title when McGuire, Scherich, Loucks and Larson teamed to place first in the 200-yard freestyle relay with a time of 1:49.74
“That race set us up for the finish,” Yevak said.
The last two individual races before the final event saw Goad claim third place in the 100-yard backstroke in a time of 1:06.09, while Loucks, Summer Wilson and Thompson finished ninth, 10th and 11th, respectively, in the 100-yard breaststroke.
That set up the final race of the day — the 400-yard freestyle relay. Rural had locked up the team title at that point, but Emporia was just nine points ahead of Manhattan for second place, and all EHS needed to do was finish third or higher to stay in that spot.
Yevak said the Emporia High swimmers not in the race lined the edge of the pool — as they had all meet long — to cheer on their teammates, as they knew something big was afoot.
With second place — and some bragging rights — on the line, Emporia’s Larson, Scherich, Goad and Starr did exactly what they needed to do by finishing third in a time of 4:03.48, which gave Emporia the one-point advantage over Manhattan.
Emporia placed four swimmers on the All-Centennial League first team: Larson, McGuire, Goad and Starr. It was the most first-teamers ever for Yevak.
“I couldn’t be more proud of this group of girls,” Yevak said. “So many of our younger swimmers stepped up and dropped times, and then our veterans, they just got the job done.
“These girls put on one of the better team performances I’ve ever seen.”