The Ankeny girls’ swimming team finally got a chance to compete in its home pool again.
The fourth-ranked Hawkettes won seven of the 12 events and defeated No. 7 Johnston, 104-82, on Tuesday at Trail Point Aquatics Center. They raised their records to 1-2 in the CIML Central Conference and 5-2 overall.
It had been more than a month since Ankeny competed in its home pool. The Hawkettes were forced out of the Trail Point facility earlier this month due to some cloudiness in the pool, which caused a dual meet against Ames on Oct. 8 to be moved to the Little Cyclones’ pool.
On Tuesday, Ankeny rebounded from back-to-back losses to No. 2 Dowling Catholic and No. 1 Ames with a strong performance against another top-10 foe.
“This was our Senior Night celebration so it was nice to come away with a win,” said Ankeny coach Michelle Stout. “Johnston is a much-improved team this year. They came ready to race, and the girls responded well with a great team effort. Winning the three relays played a big part in our success.”
The Hawkettes opened the meet by winning the 200 medley relay. The foursome of Alexis Henning, Erica Peters, Scout Bergwall and Mia Pearson posted a time of 1:51.55.
Pearson and Peters later combined with Madison Carleton and Jasmine Rumley to win the 200 freestyle relay. Ankeny was clocked in 1:40.10.
The Hawkettes ended the meet by winning the 400 freestyle relay in 3:38.22. That team consisted of Henning, Bergwall, Carleton and Rumley.
“We knew it wouldn’t be necessary to win every event, but rather outscore them in a majority of the events,” Stout said.
Rumley easily won both the sprint events. She took the 50 freestyle in 23.56 seconds and the 100 freestyle in 52.39.
The Tennessee recruit is ranked first in the state in both events.
“Jasmine continues her dominance in the (sprints),” Stout said.
Henning was the runner-up in the 50 freestyle in 25.27. She later took second in the 100 backstroke in 59.50.
Bergwall took fourth in the backstroke in 1:00.12 after earlier winning the 100 butterfly in 59.64 seconds.
“Alexis and Scout both had great nights, posting season-best times in the backstroke and meeting the automatic state qualifying time,” Stout said.
Carleton won the 500 freestyle in 5:15.77 and placed second in the 200 freestyle in 1:58.43, where she was out-touched by Johnston’s Abby Rastetter. Both were season-best times for Carleton.
Sydney Jorgensen won the diving event for the Hawkettes. She finished with 286.05 points.
Ankeny got second-place finishes from Rachel Rolow in the 200 individual medley (2:20.19), Pearson in the 100 freestyle (55.38) and Katie Brown in the 100 breaststroke (1:12.77).
The Hawkettes will compete in the Marshalltown Invitational on Saturday (diving only) before hosting the Central Conference meet on Oct. 22 and 24.