THE FRONT ROW WITH JASON ELLIOTT: T-Wolves make up for lost time in the pool

No, they didn’t get that last shining moment in 2020.

But the Lake City High girls swimming team sure made up for lost time last Saturday, wouldn’t you say?

The program’s first state team title, won in dramatic fashion over three-time defending champion Boise, it’s safe to say that shine isn’t going away anytime soon.

IN THE final race of the night, the 400-yard freestyle relay, the Lake City team of senior Emma Fritz, sophomore Riley Taylor, senior Julia Pierce and sophomore Gabby Garasky won and picked 32 team points to edge Boise 230.5 to 221.5 for the championship. Boise, which finished second by roughly 4 seconds, received 26 team points. Had Boise won the race, the Brave would have claimed another team title.

“I was kind of aware of how close it was, but wasn’t 100 percent sure,” said Pierce, a co-captain with Fritz. “Boise always puts up a good fight. I don’t think our coach wanted to tell us just how close it was, but we just had to fight as hard as we could.”

“It was an amazing feeling,” said Pierce of the win, in which Lake City set a state record in 3 minutes, 37.17 seconds. “I’ve never had a chance to experience something like this on this big of a spectrum.”

It all started with Fritz, who swam the first leg.

“I was kind of nervous going into the race,” Fritz said. “I don’t swim year-round like some of the other kids in my relay, so I was just hoping to do well. I just wanted to go out and do the best we could.”

Like Pierce, Fritz wasn’t aware of how close the final scores were.

“I was just making sure the team could do the best we could,” Fritz said. “I really had no idea we were ahead, but after I knew that, I was set on winning with my teammates.”

“I knew my teammates were relying on me,” Garasky said. “I had a suspicion that we needed to win and I needed to pull through for our team.”

Taylor also finished runner-up in the 200 individual medley.

“Riley had a shoulder injury and was told she might not swim again, then told she’d never come back,” Lake City coach Shelly Sobek said. “Watching her compete, you’d never thought she’d had to deal with any of that. It’s a big deal to watch a kid come back from that and finish second. In that particular race, you have to be talented in each stroke. To come back, it was impressive to me.”

AS THE meet progressed, Sobek knew just how close the team race was.

“The announcer was giving the updated team scores after every single race,” Sobek said. “I was writing them all down, and was nervous the entire time, because anything can happen. If one team gets disqualified in a race, the whole thing can turn upside down score wise. So I never thought we had it locked up, even for a second.”

With only two guaranteed qualifiers in each event from regionals, Lake City had six individuals qualify that way. But the Timberwolves also claimed nine wild card bids, given to swimmers with the top 16 times statewide.

"The best part of that was many of those swims were fast enough in the state to place in scoring positions," Sobek said. "Of the nine wild cards, five ended up scoring points for us."

In 2020, the Lake City girls were third in the ‘virtual’ state meet.

“Their time, effort and determination to swim year round in the offseason in club swimming has a huge impact on their success,” Sobek said. “Swimming is a sport that is hard to compete well in with just a short 12-week season. They swim with club coaches for 40 weeks of the year and they are a huge contributing factor to these athletes’ success.”

Maybe more importantly, they got a chance to finish the season the right way, win or lose.

“Our big focus this year is that we needed to be a team,” Sobek said. “And I really saw that play out throughout the season and at state. The kids decided to have goals together and when we got on the bus on Friday night after the first day at state, we talked about what their favorite part of the weekend was. Each of them talked more about what a teammate did than what they did. They were selfless and had the focus to be part of the team and fight for their success. It was great to see and be a part of.”

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for The Press. He can be reached by telephone at 208-664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @JECdAPress.