INDIANAPOLIS
For most of Friday night, Johnson County was pitching a perfect game in the girls state swimming preliminaries.
While it didn’t end perfectly, it still wound up being a pretty good night for the local squads, with 18 of the county’s 21 entries posting top-16 finishes to advance to Saturday’s finals.
All four county schools with swimming entries — Center Grove, Franklin, Greenwood and Whiteland — put themselves in position to score points Saturday.
Leading the way were the Grizzly Cubs, who will be looking to finish in the top four for the fourth consecutive year. Just about everything that needed to go their way on Friday night did.
"This was what we drew up and what we thought we could do," Franklin coach Zach DeWitt said. "You’re never going to have a perfect meet, but all in all, I can’t say that that the ball didn’t bounce our way the majority of the time.
"Our girls certainly came out here in a situation where maybe some don’t derive energy from this, but I thought we made the most of it. Our goal was always to bring our own energy and bring our own party."
Franklin’s party got off to a good start when the 200-yard medley relay team of Allie Lacy, Kabria Chapman, Grace Fisher and Gracey Payne finished with a time of 1:42.52, the fastest time of the evening session and second overall behind Carmel.
Lacy and Payne each made it into a pair of championship finals individually. Lacy swam a lifetime best of 2:01.98 in the 200 individual medley, second on the evening and third for the day, and went 55.88 seconds in the 100 backstroke to land in seventh overall.
"I don’t want to get too confident because I still have tomorrow," Lacy said, "but I just had a lot of positive momentum going forward and I feel like it really helped me throughout the meet."
Payne finished eighth in both the 50 and 100 freestyles with respective times of 23.41 and 50.99 seconds. Chapman later put up a time of 1:02.66 in the 100 breaststroke, the fastest of the evening and good enough to send her into the championship final as the No. 3 overall seed. The senior was the runner-up in the event a year ago.
Franklin also advanced to the championship heat in the 400Â freestyle relay, with Lacy, Paige Lawrence, Alea Hensley and Fisher finishing seventh in 3:30.00.
The Grizzly Cubs’ 200 free relay team of Payne, Chapman, Lawrence and Hensley was ninth in 1:36.45, missing out on the A final by one hundredth of a second. Lawrence secured two spots in consolation finals, placing 15th in the 200 freestyle (1:54.09) and 14th in the 500 free (5:06.02).
Center Grove also advanced all of its entrants into the finals. The team of Kiersten Smith, Grace Clarkston, Kylie Treat and Lara Phipps was 11th in the 200 freestyle relay with a time of 1:37.69, and the Trojans’ 400 free relay quartet of Smith, Devin Trammell, Jessica Holland and Phipps was 12th in 3:34.14.
Phipps finished 14th in the 200 free at 1:53.62, and DeLuna held on for 16th in the 100 backstroke with a time of 57.22.
"We had great swims all night," Center Grove coach Jim Todd said. "Last year we didn’t have a swim on Saturday, so we kind of made tonight’s motto to swim on Saturday."
Greenwood is poised to put points on the board Saturday as well. Its medley relay quartet of Naomi Weaver, Madison Peckinpaugh, Grace Nuhfer and Alayna Kenworthy was 12th overall in 1:48.14, good for a spot in the consolation final.
Kenworthy also earned an individual B final with the 11th-fastest overall time in the 200 IM (2:06.26), and Nuhfer was 16th in the 100 butterfly in 57.38. The Woodmen finished the night by placing 22nd in the 400 free relay (3:38.44).
Whiteland senior Addison Daily earned her way into a pair of consolation finals, finishing the day 11th overall in the 200 freestyle (1:52.77) and 12th in the 100 free (52.19).
The senior will become the first individual girls swimmer in school history to score at state.
"I came here to just see what I could do after (having knee surgery) freshman year, and I felt like I completed that," Daily said. "The 100 was what I wanted to make it back in, and I made it back in both, so I am very excited for finals. I exceeded my expectations so much."
The Warriors’ 200 free relay team of Avery Herring, Amelia Edens, Gwennyth Prellis and Daily finished 17th in 1:39.27, just .16 seconds shy of advancing, and the 400 free foursome of Edens, Haley Achs, Herring and Daily was 23rd in 3:41.17.
Turning around and swimming at the same level or better Saturday will be a challenge as always, but the hope is that the later start time — 3:30 p.m. instead of the normal 1 o’clock — will help improve performances.
"I’ll have the morning to focus, stretch, eat the right things, drink enough water, and then I’ll definitely feel ready for finals," Lacy said.
Three county divers — Center Grove’s Mia Prusiecki, Indian Creek’s Ella Taylor and Franklin’s Camy Quiggins — will also be competing Saturday. The diving prelims are set to start at 9 a.m.
