Swim season ends with 5th at state

The state swimming meet in Gillette at the end of October turned out to be a productive one for the Green River High School Girls swimming team.

One swimmer would take first in her event and strong performances by the rest of the team resulted in a solid fifth-place finish for the girls.

Junior Avery Otto-Horn earned her first-place finish in the 100-yard butterfly with a time of 58.13, shaving two one-hundredths of a second off her preliminary time. She beat juniors Pippin Robison from Sheridan High School and Logan Anderson of Cheyenne Central for the top prize in the event. Teammate Ashley Jensen took 10th in the event with a 1:03.87 finish.

Otto-Horn also finished third in the 50-yard freestyle with a time of 24.56 while teammates sophomore Patience Bentley finished with 27.40 for a 23rd-place finish and sophomore Jarin Mandros took 26 with a time of 28.38. Otto-Horn was the only Lady Wolf to receive all-state honors in the 4A Division.

The Lady Wolves also had an impressive finish in the 200-yard medley relay finals, taking fourth overall with a time of 1:52.14. That team consisted of sophomore Alexis King, junior Jesse Lauze, Otto-Horn and sophomore Ashley Jensen. The team also took fourth in the 200-yard freestyle relay, finishing at a time of 1:42.49

Jensen finished 12th in the 200-yard IM. Lauze finished 13th with a time of 2:24.25 in the preliminaries and Cherylann Moritz took 23th with a 2:29.84 finish.

In the 200-yard freestyle finals, freshman Sydni Sanders took 10th with a time of 2:03.57 while Adrienne Merrick, a freshman, took 23rd with a time of 2:13.49 in the preliminaries. Meanwhile, in 1-meter diving, senior Brianna Rath finished in 11th place, scoring 282.45.

King, swimming in the 100-yard freestyle, finished eighth at 56.98 while teammate and freshman Kaycee Olson took 17th in the event, swimming a 59.69 in the preliminaries.

In the 500-yard freestyle, Sanders took seventh with a time of 5:29.21. Moritz took 17th with 5:54.08 and freshman Emily Reyes finished 22nd with a time of 6:17.42.

King also competed in the 100-yard backstroke, taking sixth in the event at a time of 1:04.41. Reyes competed in the event, taking 25th with a preliminary time of 1:10.8.

Lauze fared well in the 100-yard breaststroke, taking eighth with a time of 1:11.90 and later joined the Lady Wolves's 400-yard freestyle relay team of Olsen, Moritz and Sanders, who finished fifth with a time of 3:56.00.

Seiloff said she was very happy with the girls' performance at state, as well as throughout the season.

The girls were one of the hardest working groups Seiloff has had in recent years and with a strong group of freshmen and sophomores, the team is poised for a strong return next year.

Now the season is over, the next step for Seiloff is boys swimming, which takes place during the winter sports season.