Great Bend Post Sports
The Panther swim team closed out the regular season at the Western Athletic Conference Championships at Barton Community College. Garden City claimed the league title with 553 points, followed by Hays with 454 points. Great Bend finished fourth with 324 points, just 12 points behind third-place Liberal.
Senior Kasey Kennedy won the 100 butterfly league title by nearly six seconds and qualified for the state meet in 59.00. The automatic state qualifying time was 59.49. Kennedy won the WAC title in the 200 IM by more than 11 seconds in 2:16.18. That time came in five-plus seconds under state consideration and less than two seconds from automatic state qualification. Junior AJ Thurman placed seventh in 3:16.62.
Senior Adam Hall won the 50 free league title by half a second in 24.43. That time is 0.15 seconds under the state consideration time and just 0.02 seconds from automatic qualification. Senior Andrew McQuade finished ninth in 27.27, and sophomore Quinton Heath placed 12th in 35.27. Hall placed second in the 100 free in 56.71 to miss the gold by just 0.2 seconds. He missed state consideration by a second and a half. Heath finished 12th in 1:26.09, and freshman Dylon Kalivoda swam 14th in 1:33.45.
Garden City took the top-two spots in the 200 medley relay, including the winner in 1:56.18. Great Bend's team of seniors Kennedy, Andrew McQuade, and Joshua Sharpe, and junior Matthew Williams placed third in 2:02.93 to miss the bronze by half a second and miss the state consideration time by three-plus seconds.
Williams finished third in the 500 free in 6:45.52 to miss the silver by 21 seconds. Junior Jordan Sander placed fourth in 6:49.88. Sander placed sixth in the 200 free in 2:27.94 to miss the bronze by six seconds. Williams swam seventh in the 100 breast in 1:27.59 to miss the bronze by 11 seconds. Thurman placed 12th in 1:34.99.
The 200 free relay team of Hall, Sharpe, McQuade, and Kennedy finished third in 1:44.93 to miss the silver by 1.59 seconds and miss state consideration by less than a second. The 400 free relay squad of Sharpe, Williams, Sander, and Hall placed fifth in 4:28.12 to miss the bronze by nine seconds.
McQuade placed fifth in the 100 back in 1:22.17, less than three seconds behind the bronze. Kalivoda finished 13th in 1:52.62.
The Class 5-1A State Swimming & Diving Championships will be held from Thursday, Feb. 15 through Saturday, Feb. 17 at the Capital Federal Natatorium in Topeka.