WIAA DIV. 2 ASHWAUBENON SWIM SECTIONAL - Season ends with some solid swims at the sectional

WIAA DIV. 2 ASHWAUBENON SWIM SECTIONAL

The Medford Raiders boys swim season ended Saturday with more personalbest times and a 10th-place finish at the WIAA Division 2 Ashwaubenon sectional.

Mason Reimann had Medford’s highest individual finish, placing ninth out of 15 competitors in the 200-yard individual medley. Reimann got there with a personal-best time of 2:24.39, easily surpassing the 2:27.03 he set eight days earlier at the Great Northern Conference meet. Reimann edged out Pulaski’s Patrick Reynolds by 0.34 seconds for the ninth spot.

Reimann added an 11th-place finish in the 100-yard butterfly, also setting a new best time at 1:06.35. He lowered that time by 0.78 seconds and missed the top 10 out of 16 swimmers by 0.98 seconds.

Logan Rouiller capped his strong sophomore year with a pair of top-15 finishes in his distance freestyle events.

Rouiller was 14th out of 19 swimmers in the 200-yard freestyle, lowering his time to 2:09.6 from the 2:11.38 he posted at the conference meet. Teammate Rhys Buskerud added an 18th-place time of 2:46.59 that was also the freshman’s top time of the winter.

In the 500-yard freestyle, Rouiller just off his personal-best time of 5:51.97, finishing in 5:53.94, good for 15th place ahead of two Menomonie swimmers.

In relays, Medford got an eighthplace finish from its 400-yard freestyle team of Brandon Curtlis, Reese Travis, Dawson Gasek and Rouiller to end the meet. Their time of 5:04.69 was just 0.25 seconds off their season-best. They placed ahead of Pulaski, who disqualified. Rhinelander won the race in 3:18.35, while Ashwaubenon (3:23.18), River Falls (3:28.31) and Rice Lake (3:29.84) also qualified for state.

The 200-yard freestyle relay team of Reimann, Buskerud, Roger Mann and Travis was ninth in 2:04.87, also missing a season-best by a fraction of a second, 0.28 seconds to be exact. The Raiders finished ahead of Tomahawk, who disqualified. Six teams qualified for state in the race, led by Rhinelander, who finished in 1:29.94.

The 200-yard individual medley team of Rouiller, Mann, Reimann and Buskerud was 10th in 2:13.5, trailing ninth-place Antigo by 14.18 seconds. Rhinelander (1:38.68), Ashwaubenon (1:42.02) and the Sturgeon Bay Co-op (1:45.7) got the top three spots and advanced to state.

Buskerud dropped to a personal-best time of 1:46.21 in the 100-yard breaststroke, cutting 3.78 seconds off his previous best. That was good for 16th place ahead of Mann, who unfortunately disqualified. Mann was 17th in the 100-yard freestyle at 1:05.15, while Travis took 19th in 1:10.89.

Travis cut 0.16 seconds while placing 24th in the 50-yard freestyle. Gasek was 26th in 34.47 seconds and Curtis was 27th at 37.16 seconds, 1.16 seconds ahead of Tomahawk’s Toby Scott. Curtis ended his year by setting a new personal-best time of 1:34.72 in the 100-yard backstroke. He dropped his time by 0.66 seconds and placed ahead of Gasek, who also had an unfortunate DQ.

Rhinelander, the GNC champion and defending WIAA Division 2 state champion, won the meet with 389 points, 24 more than Ashwaubenon, and sent 16 entries to this Friday’s WIAA Division 2 state championships at Waukesha South High School. Event champions automatically qualified for state and Rhinelander had seven of those. Swimmers, divers or relay teams who recorded times or scores that were among the top 12 non-winning times statewide also advanced.

Medford, who has no seniors on its seven-man squad led by second-year head coach Terry Werner, scored 75 points to fall 32 points behind GNC rival and ninthplace Antigo in the 10-team meet.