Bryant boys second at North Little Rock meet
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JACKSONVILLE — Michael Higgs won two events and Chandler Reep won another but the short-handed Bryant Hornets finished second in the team standings to a deep Little Rock Catholic Rockets team at the Thomas Holter Memorial swim meet held Thursday, Dec. 11.
Catholic topped the seven-team field with 685 points. Bryant was second with 423. Cabot was third at 313 with North Little Rock fourth at 286. Searcy (30), Lonoke (23) and Benton (16) also competed at the event held at the Jacksonville Community Center pool.
The meet was held in memory of a 2011 graduate of North Little Rock, a member of the Charging Wildcats swim team from 2008-2011, who was killed in a motorcycle accident June 17, 2014.
Higgs won the 200 yard individual medley with a time of 2:11.65 beating out Cabot’s Jordan Woodson (2:14.84). Bryant’s Fonzee Bittle was fourth in 2:22.56 with Jacob Rhode seventh in 2:39.76.
Higgs also won the 100 yard butterfly with a time of 58.80. Catholic’s Ryan Pohlkamp was second at 1:02.55 with Reep third in 1:03.50.
Reep won the 100 yard breast stroke, turning in a 1:05.88 clocking to edge North Little Rock’s Josh Hale (1:06.52). Bittle was seventh with a time of 1:11.97.
Bryant picked up second-place points in the 200 freestyle relay with Reep, Higgs, Bittle and Andrew Ball combining on a 1:39.69 to finish on the heels of Catholic’s quartet of Matthew Noonan, Alex Eichler, Michael Wilde and Mark Moellers (1:38.43). The Hornets had a B team entry of Cody Tarvin, Druid Wen, Wilhelm Wubbena and Kyle Henry, which earned eighth-place points with a 1:57.92 clocking.
Henry, Bittle and Rhode teamed up with Derek Vos on a 3:57.87 time in the 400 freestyle relay, good for third. Catholic won in 3:42.11 with Moellers, Braden Gentry, Andrew Mackenzie and Jacob Toland teaming up.
Ball turned in an individual third-place finish in the 50 free with a time of 25.86. Wubbena was 10th in 29.61, Tarvin 12th in 32.06, and Karim Elmansoury 14th in 34.87 to add to Bryant’s scoring. North Little Rock’s Lee Smothers won the race in 23.84.
In the 200 free, Henry was fourth in 2:04.89 and Ball was seventh in 2:13.08. Mason Graves of North Little Rock won the event in 2:01.34 but, in a show of their depth, Catholic’s Rockets had seven swimmers score points.
Vos, Reep, Higgs and Ball teamed up in the 200 medley relay, taking fourth in 1:55.93. North Little Rock’s Graves, Matt Brown, Smothers and Hale combined on a 1:46.66 to take first.
Vos was fifth individually in the 100 back stroke with a time of 1:12.36 while Henry took fifth in the 500 free in 5:56.35. Vos was followed up by Wen’s 1:26.46, good for ninth-place points and Wubbena’s 1:34.42, which was fourth. Smothers won the event for North Little Rock in 59.44.
Henry was joined by Rhode in scoring in the 500. Rhode’s 6:01.00 was sixth. Catholic’s Toland won in 5:10.11.
In the 100 free, Vos was eighth in 1:02.76 and Tarvin 14th in 1:11.57. Hale paced the field in 52.10.
