BUFFALO, NY - A tremendous weekend in the waters of the Region 3 championships was capped by several team and individual awards for Jamestown Community College (JCC) Sunday afternoon. The three-day event held at Erie Community College saw the JCC women's swimming and diving team capture another regional championship with 564 points, almost 200 points clear of second place.
"It's awesome to win back-to-back regional titles on the women's side; they have worked hard and have stayed focused on the task at hand. Desiree Putt to win all her events, the veteran leadership from Anna Jones, and to see Emily Swan and Sophia Gervasio have swims and a meet like they did. I'm super proud," said head coach Todd Conklin.
For the men, it was the Jayhawks taking the runner-up spot of the six teams.
"On the men's side, it was exciting all week to see what they did, but this is our first hardware from this meet on the men's side in five years. Kyle Dean and Zach Johnson are leading the way in winning all of their individuals and seeing the rest have best swims all week was amazing," added Conklin.
With his perfect weekend and taking down several records, Dean led a trio of Jayhawks to bring home a plaque, being named both the Region 3 Male Swimmer of the Meet and the Region 3 Male Swimmer of the Year.
"Super proud of Kyle Dean and what he achieved this week with the numbers, meet records, pool record, and countless school records," said Conklin on the accomplishments.
Along with Dean, Ashlynn Swan earned the Region 3 Female Diver of the Meet; she took down both the ladies' one-meter and three-meter events.
Head Coach Todd Conklin was also named the Region 3 Women's Coach of the Year, a season after winning the Women's National Coach of the Year award.
"Ashlynn Swan winning diver of the meet is well deserved with all the hours she puts in with extra training. She was solid all weekend on both boards. Finally, the Region 3 Coach of the Year award doesn't come without the performance of the kids or the dedication from my assistant coaches. I'm lucky to have a great staff and even better student athletes," mentioned a smiling Conklin.
Sunday was the shortest of the three days of events. Jamestown started out fantastic with Anna Jones finishing second in the 50 butterfly and Cameron Milewski winning the event for the guys.
Next up was the grueling 1650 free, where JCC took the top two spots as Gervasio topped teammate Addison Lawson by almost a minute. Noah Miles, who is normally a speed swimmer, stepped up and finished fourth for the men in the mile.
Then came the women's 100 free; Emily Swan brought home a second for Jamestown; she was less than four tenths behind first. Randall Hall took eighth for the men.
Another record fell in the 200 back; Kyle Dean broke the program mark with a 2:01:91. That was the last of ten record-breaking events for JCC.
"Regarding all the records falling, it's truly a testimony to our program and the belief in our program. The coaches Bill Rollinger, Bill Spaulding, Claire Johnson, and I believe in each one of these kids and their ability to do amazing things, and that's what we did. It was great to see Kyle Dean and Zach Johnson rewrite the record book and then the quartet of boys break the relays. They have grown together, and the results show it," mentioned Conklin.
Dean was joined on the podium in the 200 back by Christian Merrill, who came in third. For the ladies, Desiree Putt finished a weekend where she was a perfect four-for-four in her individual swims with another win.
Zach Johnson also went four-for-four in individual events and finished the weekend with a victory in 200 breast; he was almost seven seconds ahead of second. Kyle Camp and Hall finished sixth and ninth, respectively. Haleigha Hardy captured second for the women, close to eight seconds ahead of third.
In the diving well, the aforementioned Ashlynn Swam won the 3-meter by over 35 points. Milewski finished second but is closing ground on first, falling by less than four points.
The last events of the day and meet were the 400 free relays. The men's team of Johnson, Miles, Milewski, and Dean capped the day with a second. The ladies team of Jones, Putt, Jalyn Linton, and Emily Swan slammed the door on the competition with a win by 30 seconds.
"It was truly an exciting weekend, and the kids swam fantastically. Coming into the meet, my expectations were that we would have some great swims and we would have some bad. Well, we took care of the great swims all weekend, and truthfully, there were no bad ones. We got rolling early and took the momentum and the excitement from all the great swims and finished with an amazing weekend," said a proud head coach, Todd Conklin.
JCC now has a couple of weeks to improve in practice before they return to Erie Community College's Burt Flickinger Athletic Center for nationals on March 5th to the 8th.
