The Ankeny boys’ swimming team earned a runner-up finish in a district meet on Saturday at Summit Middle School in Johnston.
More importantly, the Hawks qualified for the state meet in all three relays while advancing eight of their swimmers in a total of 12 individual events.
“We had a good meet!” said Ankeny coach Dustin Rhoads. “Of course we wanted to win the team title, but the No. 1 goal was to get as many people as possible to the state meet and we had nine qualify!”
Fourth-ranked Sioux City West won the team title with 473 points. No. 11 Ankeny finished with 412 points, while No. 12 Johnston took third in the eight-team field with 312.
Junior Bryer Pearson provided the Hawks’ lone victory on Saturday. He won the 100 butterfly in a time of 51.26 seconds.
Pearson also qualified for state in the 50 freestyle. He took seventh in that event in 22.47.
“I’m definitely happy with my time from my 100 fly, but I think there is still some work to be done for my 50 free as I think I could have done better,” said Pearson.
Ankeny’s Brock Peterson, Wilson Pous-Ojeda and Finn Stukerjurgen also qualified for state in a pair of individual events. Sam Howard, Noah Kearney, Austin Troyer and Jack Walsh are the Hawks’ other individual qualifiers.
Stukerjurgen placed second in the 100 backstroke in 53.93. He earlier took fourth in the 200 individual medley in 1:59.47.
Peterson placed third in the 200 IM in 1:58.39. He then finished third in the butterfly in 53.09.
Pous-Ojeda also placed third in two events. He posted times of 1:49.49 in the 200 freestyle and 5:03.29 in the 500 freestylehir.
Kearney placed third in the backstroke in 55.02. Troyer was fourth in the 50 freestyle in 22.14.
Walsh took fifth in the 200 IM in 2:03.60. Howard finished sixth in the butterfly in 54.59.
Ankeny opened the meet with a third-place finish in the 200 medley relay. The foursome of Stukerjurgen, Peterson, Pearson and Troyer was clocked in 1:38.89.
Troyer later teamed up with Peterson, Stukerjurgen and Jake Smith for a second-place finish in the 200 freestyle relay. The Hawks posted a time of 1:29.58.
Smith also swam the anchor leg on the 400 freestyle relay, helping Ankeny to a fourth-place finish. He was joined on the relay by Pearson, Howard and Kearney.
“Credit to Sioux City–they swam really well,” Rhoads said. “But I’m really proud of this group. We lost a lot of guys from last year and dealt with a lot of adversity this year, but we stuck together and swam very well today.”
The state meet will be held on Friday and Saturday at Iowa City. The Hawks will be looking to improve on last year’s ninth-place finish.
“We still have some left in the tank for state, and I’m excited to take this group to the best pool in the state to compete with the best in Iowa,” Rhoads said.
Pearson is seeded eighth in the butterfly, while Peterson is 11th in the 200 IM and 16th in the butterfly. Stukerjurgen is 13th in both of his individual events.
Kearney is seeded 17th in the backstroke, Troyer is 20th in the 50 freestyle, Walsh is 26th in the 200 IM, Pearson is 27th in the 50 freestyle, Howard is 29th in the butterfly, and Pous-Ojeda is 29th and 32nd, respectively, in the 200 and 500 freestyle events.
Ankeny is seeded 13th in the medley relay, 14th in the 200 freestyle relay and 20th in the 400 freestyle relay.
“A lot of us have not fully tapered yet and after this week of training, we should all be at 100 percent and see some more big time drops,” Pearson said.