Being the smallest team in Class LL didn’t deter the Shelton High girls swimming team. Shelton finished ninth in the 21-team Class LL championships at Southern Connecticut State University Wednesday night with 230.5 points.
“I think they did very well,” said Gaelettes coach Sara Collimore. “We had a lot of ground to make up after Saturday’s trials and they improved.”
Shelton senior co-captain Kathryn Kiely took 13th place in the 200-yard freestyle with a time of 2:00.10. Sophomore Meghan Poole (2:04.61) and senior co-captain Jenna Callahan (2:06.31) took 18th and 21st in the 200-free.
Junior Colleen Stewart (2:19.47) was 19th in the 200-yard individual medley. Junior Kaitlin Davis (26.19) and sophomore Kaitlyn Siriano (26.65) were 13th and 23rd, respectively in the 50-yard freestyle.
The Gaelettes’ diving representative, junior Nicole DeMarco (337.65) placed seventh.
Kiely (1:00.78) took 10th in the 100-yard butterfly. Davis (56.75), placed 14th in the 100-yard freestyle.
Callahan (5:37.was 16th in the 500-yard freestyle.
Stewart, Poole, senior Rebecca Odgers and Siriano quartet led the 200-yard freestyle relay team (1:47.69) to 12th place.
Stewart (1:12.39) and Poole (1:13.74) were 12th and 13th, respectively, at Class LL. Shelton closed out the meet strong. Junior Kelli Freer, Siriano, Davis and Kiley for the 400-yard freestyle relay team (3:49.64), powering them to seventh place.
The Gaelettes finished the season at 9 – 3. They were fourth in the SCC championship, out of 13 teams, losing to Class LL and SCC champion Cheshire, Amity and Branford in the league, which was big.
“I think we accomplished what we wanted to,” said Callahan.
Kiely said, “We’re all very happy. It’s a challenge to swim against them but we all did very well.”
Collimore said, “We did better than last year. The girls didn’t lose any ground from last year and ran with it. The Rapids [USS swimming] program definitely helped us out.”
