Eight Sweet Home Huskies traveled to the state swimming meet at Mt. Hood Community College Friday and Saturday and all eight brought home a medal in at least one event.
The Husky boys finished second with 47 points behind champion LaGrande’s 57. Valley Catholic was third in 33 and Astoria was fourth with 26.
Wilsonville won the girls championship with 82 points and was followed by Cascade with 39, Philomath 30 and Sherwood 29.
Husky senior Rhys Birky capped a stellar high school career, setting a new state record in the 100 breast stroke, winning the 200 IM and anchoring the championship 400 free relay.
“It was a lot of fun,” Birky said. “It felt good. I’m happy about it because it was definitely my goal.”
Birky said he barely nipped the old state mark in the 100 breast stroke (1:01.79) with his 1:01.7.
The hard-working Birky cut more than a second off his previous best time to capture the championship and move to the third fastest time in SHHS history in that event.
“I had held back a little in the preliminaries, just enough to qualify for finals,” Birky said of his strategy. “I went as hard as I possibly could in the finals and nailed every turn.”
Birky had high praise for his fellow teammates.
“It was pretty cool how our guys pulled together,” Birky said. “We worked hard as a team. It’s a great bunch of buys.”
Birky also won the 200 IM in 2:00.6, the second fastest time in school history.
He rounded out his trio of medals by anchoring the 400 free relay along with teammates Sean Martin, Jeff Ecker and Chris Bate. The foursome posted a championship time of 3:25.4, the second fastest time in school history.
The same guys finished third in the 200 medley relay in 1:47.9.
Birky won’t bask in his accomplishments long, he will compete statewide and regionally over the next three weekends in senior championships and regional sectional events.
Individually, sophomore Sean Martin finished seventh in the 200 freestyle in 1:57.7 and had a great finish in the 500 freestyle, taking second in 5:09.6, the sixth fastest time in school history.
Jeff Ecker, a junior, also finished strong with a third place in the 100 backstroke in 58.4 and fifth place finish in the 100 freestyle in 51.8.
Chris Bate finished seventh in the 200 IM to round out the Husky effort.
Megan Blank was the highest placing individual girl, taking seventh in the 50 freestyle in 27.0.
She joined Andrea Yunke, Nicole Starha and Marie Duncan in churning out a 2:06.4 for fifth in the 200 medley relay.
“I’m very proud of every one of these kids,” Coach Doug Peargin said. “Eight went and eight brought home a medal. To go is a thrill but to get a medal is like dessert after a good meal.”
Coach Peargin said he believes his Huskies picked up every point possible.
“LaGrande is a tremendous team. I had seen results of one of their earlier meets and I knew they were going to be very tough,” Coach Peargin said. “They took nine kids and eight got medals.”
The Huskies won the 400 freestyle relay because “we put in the yards” Coach Peargin said of the Husky training regime.
“We improved out time by four seconds in that event,” Coach Peargin said. “I think it was like every guy on the team stepped up and wanted to give this one to Rhys (Birky) as a way of saying thanks for his leadership this year. He’s done a great job.”
Every one of the relay swimmers had a lifetime best time that day.
“I’m especially proud of how the kids conducted them both at the meet and in general,” Coach Peargin said. “This has been a great team to work with all year. No discipline problems at all. They acted like adults at state.”
Coach Peargin also thanked his unpaid assistant coaches Rene Kirkland, Josh Peargin and Bruce West.
“Each one of these guys has a job to do every day at practice,” Coach Peargin said. “Without them, we wouldn’t have been half the team we were.”