Boys Swimming and Diving: Pressly shines as Knights finish in 8th at states

By Ben Spector
Winning After MidKnight

                       

The Middletown High School Knights Boys Swimming and Diving team knew that they would need a perfect set of performances from their swimmers to even challenge the Poolesville High School Falcons.

They wouldn’t. The day was still special for Middletown because of the swimming that came from Knights sophomore John Pressly. Pressly strung together a series of excellent races for the Knights, not only giving himself two state championships but also helping two Middletown relays to high finishes.

Pressly started off his day in the 200 yard freestyle and immediately out of the gate in his first event would pick up a state title finishing with a time of 1:47.48, adding 20 points to his team’s total.

Then in his 2^nd event, the 100 yard butterfly, Pressly would pick up a state title finishing just under a second ahead of 2^nd place, touching the wall with a time of 52.27 giving Middletown another 20 points.

The 3^rd event for Pressly was the 200 yard freestyle relay and Pressly would not disappoint in his leg, the fourth and final one. Pressly would swim a 22.02 in that leg giving his team an overall time of 1:36.17. Pressly was the catalyst for the 5^th place finish for Middletown surging from the back and pulling the Knights out of last place. The 5^th place finish for the Knights would give them 28 points.

In true fashion, Pressly would not disappoint in his 4^th and final event, the 400 yard freestyle relay. Pressly would again swim the fastest leg for Middletown in their heat, giving the Knights a 1^st place finish in their heat and a 7^th place finish overall, giving them 24 points to add toward their total.

Middletown would finish the day in 8^th place with 100 points. Of those 100 points, 90 of them would come from events in which Pressly personally swam in. So as far as things were today, it was all pretty much the John Pressly show for Middletown fans in Landover.

Pressly was one of three double winners on the day as Kevin Lin of the Urbana High School Hawks and Griffin Alaniz of the Rockville High School Rams picked up two individual state titles on the day.

The Knights also got finishes from other swimmers to complement the massive number of points that Pressly put up over the course of the meet.

Middletown sophomore Jacob Boone would finish the 500 yard freestyle, the most daunting and cardio-intensive of the races with a time of 5:36.72 good enough for 11^th place and 6 points for Middletown.

Middletown senior Tristen Martinez, a Tuscarora transfer in his first and only season with the Knights would compete in the 100 yard breaststroke and finish with a time of 1:09.58 good enough for 15^th place and 2 points for the Knights.

Even though Middletown was nowhere at the level that state champions Poolesville were at they can take solace in the fact that they are building and becoming stronger and stronger each year.

The two best swimmers on the Middletown boys team, the aforementioned Pressly and Boone are both only sophomores with two years to develop and lower their times.

Along with Boone and Pressly, some of the swimmers who placed in the Middletown relay teams were Tyler Sheppard and Hayden Springer both of whom are also only sophomores.

That leaves the Knights with a very strong core of young swimmers with two years of development still left and a team in general that is very capable of doing big things.

The Knights left Landover disappointed that they weren’t taking a team title back to the Happy Valley but it wasn’t all for not as the Knights got a glimpse of one kid, his jaw-dropping day and a pretty glimpse of the future.