December 14, 2018 at 12:55 p.m.
Depth charge
Hodag swimmers pull away late to beat Lakeland 95-66
Depth charge
Rhinelander's depth showed through Thursday night as the team posted a string of 1-2 finishes down the stretch to pull away from Lakeland and defeat the T-Birds 95-66 at the Heck Family Community Pool.
The win puts Rhinelander (5-0) two meets up on Lakeland, Shawano and Tomahawk (3-2) halfway through the dual meet portion of the conference schedule.
Lakeland's quartet of top end swimmers - Liam Hogan, Tyler Teichmiller, Alex Tucker and Brandon Boh - gave Rhinelander a run for its money and combined to win five events but, ultimately, the Hodags' depth won the night.
"They swam really fast. They swam the fastest they did all season. They knew they had to do what they needed to do to win the meet," Rhinelander coach Jenny Heck said of her team's performance. "(The T-Birds) have some fast swimmers. We knew they had a chance to win almost everything going in. We put our best lineup tonight and we hoped that we could just win more than they did."
Rhinelander's lead wasn't comfortable until late in the program. One-two finishes in the 200-yard freestyle relay, the 100 backstroke and the 100 breaststroke took a 54-47 lead with four events remaining and ballooned it to 89-58 heading into the final race.
Joseph Heck, Martin Hoger, Russell Benoy and Nolan Francis picked up the win in the 200 freestyle relay with a time of 1 minute, 34.29 seconds. Teammates Thaddeus Heck, Ashton Cole, Cooper Kovac and Jacob Schoppe finished second at 1:57.41.
David King (1:02.92) and Hoger followed with a 1-2 finish in the 100 backstroke and Thaddeus Heck (1:07.67) edged his cousin, Joseph, for the win in the 100 breaststroke. They both beat Teichmiller for Lakeland in a race that featured the top three finishers in the event from last year's GNC championship meet.
"Those were all great races and those 1-2 scored a lot of points. I'm really proud of the guys. They did fantastic," coach Heck said. "We have a little more depth, that helps us. But they have some fast swimmers and can really push us to do better. I think that's what happened tonight. We pushed them and they pushed us."
Nolan Francis broke his own Heck Pool record in the 200 individual medley with a time of 2:02.43, beating the mark of 2:03.20 he set in a Nov. 29 win over Medford. Joseph Heck edged Boh for the runner up spot in the event.
The 200 IM was the only event Rhinelander won before intermission. Lakeland won three of the first four races and led 30-29 at the break.
Liam Hogan had a particularly strong night for the T-Birds. He swam the anchor leg of the 200 medley relay and rallied from behind to give Lakeland the win by 0.35 seconds. He also edged Benoy for the win in the 50 freestyle and Francis by less than a second to win the 100 freestyle. Teichmiller added a win for Lakeland in the 200 freestyle and Lakeland's strong quartet of Boh, Tucker, Teichmiller and Hogan won the 400 freestyle relay.
King scored a win for Rhinelander in the 100 butterfly (57.94), edging Tucker to the wall by 0.17 seconds. Benoy took the 100 freestyle (50.88).
"It was fun and great races the whole night. We always enjoy swimming against Lakeland because they have a great program, a great team," coach Heck said.
The Hodag coach added that she's still tinkering with the lineup in the relays, trying to figure out the best combination. The team received a good test Thursday as Lakeland stacked the 200 medley and 400 freestyle relays with its four top swimmers.
"I think we were able to determine some things from tonight," she said. "We didn't know how they were going to stack their relays. They were either going to go for the medley or they were going to go for the 200 free and the 400 free. They went for the medley. Had we put together our fastest four for the medley, we would have had that too. That's part of the game."
While Rhinelander is undefeated in conference duals, the only meet that matters in determining a conference champion is the GNC meet at Medford Feb. 1.
"We're just training really hard. We didn't let up for Lakeland and we're not going to let up soon," coach Heck said. "We're just going to train harder and harder. We have to do that because the season is short and, before you know it, comes conference and sectionals and state."
The Hodags will travel to Tomahawk this Tuesday to kick off the second half of the conference schedule. It will be Rhinelander's final meet before the holiday break.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
Comments:
You must login to comment.