Medford’s depth dunks the Tridents by surprising margin

With their best top-to-bottom performance of the new season Thursday, the Medford Raiders earned a surprisingly dominant 109-61 win over the Ladysmith Co-op at the MASH pool and improved to 2-0 in Great Northern Conference dual meets.

The Raiders won all three relays, swept the top three spots in two individual races and earned most of the second- and third-place points to cruise to the easy win over the Tridents, who fell to 1-1 and were coming off a solid Sept. 2 win over Lakeland.

“We went into this meet knowing it would be tough,” Medford head coach Betsy Meinel said. “Ladysmith is usually always our biggest challenge in conference. We look forward to this meet all season and it did not disappoint. Almost every girl had a personal best time. It gives us a lot of hope for the rest of the season.”

One of the two sweeps came in the 100yard breaststroke where freshman Chelsea Gebauer lowered her time to 1:17.87, Aiden Denzer took second in 1:18.38 and Jordyn Johnson set a personal-best while finishing third in 1:25.2.

“Jordyn had a great meet with solid relay splits and a great 100 breaststroke,” Meinel said.

The other sweep was in the 200-yard individual medley, where Denzer won in 2:30.64, Sydney Sperl was second in 2:37.71 and Jackie Williams was third in a personal-best 2:48.57.

Senior Kami Razink won the 50-yard freestyle in a season-best 27.48 seconds, a half-second ahead of Trident Sadie Heath. Lacey Brandner was third in a personal-best 29.14 seconds and Cadance Haenel (32.22) got the fifth-place point.

Denzer, Gebauer, Sperl and Razink started the relay success by winning the 200-yard medley race in 2:03.96, 4.7 seconds ahead of Ladysmith’s top team. Tana Rappe, Johnson, Erica Brandner and Maddie Williams got the two thirdplace points in 2:15.69, while Madisyn Pilgrim, Jackie Williams, Shaniah Brandt and Lydia Pernsteiner were fourth in 2:34.59.

Rappe, Lacey Brandner, Gebauer and Razink easily won the 200-yard freestyle relay in 1:54.8, while Erica Brandner, Breanna Kraemer, Johnson and Denzer were next at 1:58.09. Kirsten Weix, Kassidy Koncel, Haenel and Colby Bergman teamed up to place fourth in 2:10.66.

Sperl, Lacey Brandner, Gebauer and Razink finished the meet with a winning time of 4:16.9 in the 400-yard freestyle relay, 7.66 seconds ahead of Ladysmith’s top team. Weix, Jackie Williams, Bergman and Kraemer were third in 4:41.77, while Brandt, Mackenzie Petersen, Pilgrim and Pernsteiner were fourth at 5:06.66.

Trident Madeline Bunton won the 100yard backstroke in 1:05.93, but Kraemer (1:11.95), Maddie Williams (1:15.02) and Pilgrim (1:27.01) swept the next three spots with season-best times. Lacey Brandner set a new best time in the 200yard freestyle at 2:18.41, good for second place behind Bunton (2:08.54). Rappe was third in 2:25.79 and Koncel was fifth while lowering her time to 2:41.65.

Heath won the 100-yard freestyle in 1:04.65, but the Raiders swept the next three spots with Rappe (1:05.15), Weix (1:08.59) and Petersen (1:13.12).

Trident Madilyn Kempen took the 100yard butterfly in 1:10.24, but the Raiders grabbed eight of the 10 available points after that with Sperl (1:13.91), Erica Brandner (1:15.09) and Maddie Williams (1:22.41) taking second, third and fifth. All three times were season bests.

“Erica had a fantastic 100 fly,” Meinel said. “She dropped five seconds from her time last week.”

Pernsteiner cut over nine seconds from her previous race in the 500-yard freestyle and took second in 6:50.03. Bergman’s first 500 of 2021 resulted in a fourth-place time of 7:03.82 and Brandt was fifth at 7:29.23.

Bergman (30.38), Weix (30.91) and Koncel (33.68) took the top three spots in the JV 50-yard freestyle. Kraemer (1:08.25), Jackie Williams (1:08.37) and Haenel (1:14.78) did the same in the 100-yard freestyle. Erica Brandner (1:17.21), Petersen (1:26.14) and Brandt (1:32.47) were the lone entrants in the JV backstroke.

Medford looks to go to 3-0 in the GNC today, Thursday, when it visits Antigo. The Raiders will take on defending GNC and WIAA Division 2 state champion Rhinelander Sept. 23 at the MASH pool.

“We are excited to take this lineup into our upcoming meets,” Meinel said. “Our depth is proving to be very helpful and we are hoping that we can use that to be very competitive in the conference this year.”