It was the first meet of the season, but state qualifying times were already there for the taking, and the Demons did some taking Friday.
Jocelyn Earl and Violet Witchel each earned individual qualifying times for Durango in the team’s home meet Friday at Fort Lewis College. Grand Junction, Montezuma-Cortez and Montrose attended the meet, with Grand Junction taking first place with 694.5 points thanks to depth with a lot of relay teams. Durango was second with 572 points, and head coach Thomas Joyner cited his team’s lack of depth in those relays for not coming away with a team win.
Montrose took third with 523 points, and Cortez was fourth with 383.5 points.
“Pretty good meet for us,” Joyner said. “It’s hard when you don’t have enough kids for all those relays.”
Joyner is excited about his team being moved down to Class 3A this year. After years of sending only a handful of kids to the state meet, he hopes to bring the entire team in 2017.
“The qualifying times are more forgiving in 3A,” he said. “I’m excited about it because we’ll bring more girls to state.”
Friday’s meet started with the 200-yard medley relay, which was won by Montrose in 2 minutes, 2.20 seconds. Durango’s team of Steevie Delio, Mira Joyner, Witchel and Mina Willemin was third in 2:07.02. Another Durango team of Emily and Katelyn Doughty, Earl and Lacey Hoselton was fourth.
Earl then claimed first place with a state-qualifying time of 2:09.19 in the 200-yard free. She beat Grand Junction’s Chole Dalton by more than 15 seconds.
Earl also qualified with a second-place finish in the 500-yard free, as she finished in 5:51.44. She finished behind Grand Junction’s Delaney Kidd, who had a very strong meet of her own.
“It felt really good,” Earl said of earning qualifying times. “It was kind of cool to get it done the first meet, and now I can keep improving on it from there.”
Witchel’s qualifying time came in the 50-yard free. She won in 26.44 seconds. Kidd was second in 26.93. Withchel also placed third in the 500-yard free in 6:00.07, which was just off a state qualifying time.
Durango’s Mira Joyner took third in the 100-yard free. Kianna Coliazzi of Grand Junction won in 1:02.76. Joyner finished in 1:06.70.
Durango’s 200-yard freestyle team of the Doughtys, Joyner and Stottlemyer swam to second place in 1:55.74. Montezuma-Cortez was first in 1:51.46. The 400-yard free relay team of Earl, Stottlemyer, Willemin and Witchel was second in 4:14.08. Montrose won that relay in 4:07.79.
Durango’s top finish in the 100-yard backstroke came from Riley Mata in eighth with a time of 1:22.32. Sam Bagge of Montezuma-Cortez won the event.
Mira Joyner had a strong swim in the 100-yard breaststroke with a second-place finish in 1:21.29. Avery Pope of Grand Junction was first in 1:16.48.
Maggie McHugh of Montrose won the 200-yard individual medley in 2:21.53. Durango’s top performance in the event came from Willemin in 2:35.30. That was good for fifth place.
Durango had five of the nine divers in the 1-meter diving event. Ruby Epstein won with a score of 148.30. Kylie Behn was second with 137.90, and Olivia Mummery delivered a clean sweep of the top three places for Durango with 130.85.
“It was great to open at home on home turf,” Earl said. “It made us want to compete extra hard.”
Durango is back at it at 10 a.m. Saturday at Cortez.
jlivingston@durangoherald.com
