Cape boys, Sussex Academy girls win conference titles
The Sussex Academy girls and the Cape Henlopen boys took top honors at the Henlopen Conference swim meet held Feb. 10 at the Sussex Academy Aquatic Center.
The Seahawks girls finished with 386 points, and Cape took second with 335. Sussex Academy also took Southern Division honors, while Cape claimed the top finish for the Northern Division title.
The Vikings boys took first with 464 points, and the Seahawks finished second with 335 points. The squads won the North and South division titles, respectively.
Indian River coaches Colin Crandell and Donna Smith garnered top coaching honors.
The outstanding swimmer awards were presented to Sussex Academy’s Anna Mumford for the girls and Polytech’s Jacob Madden for the boys.
In all, seven conference records were broken on the day. The Cape boys’ 200 medley relay team of Brian Fleming, Holden Tighe, Shane Toback and Kevin Lewandowski swam 1:40.51 to best the 2013 record of 1:41.82. The same four broke the 400 free relay record of 3:20.73, set in 2018, with their time of 3:18.63. A new boys’ breaststroke record was set by Lake Forest’s Kyle Parkham with a time of 1:01.00, breaking the 2013 record of 1:01.47.
Mumford broke the 2003 record of 1:57.21 in the 200 freestyle with a time of 1:54.34. She also broke the 500 free record of 5:13.56, set in 2021, with a time of 5:01.76. Sussex Academy teammate Gracie Maughan broke the 2003 100 fly record of 1:00.23 with a time of 57.79. She also bested the 2023 record of 1:04.83 in the 100 breaststroke with a time of 1:04.33.
“In the nine years of Sussex Academy being part of the Henlopen Conference, I’ve never seen so many records broken in one meet,” said Seahawks coach Tom Martiner. “It really is a testament to the quality athletes we have in our conference.”
“We are super excited with the effort put forth by our kids today,” said Cape coach Bill Geppert. “Obviously trying to win the meet is the first thing we plan for, getting the kids in the right events. Some of them need to shave a little more time to make states. But by far the most important thing is that we all bring our best performances of the season to the conference meet. Maximum effort is what we stress. They really delivered – faster times, enthusiasm and a great mental state.”
