HIBBING—Rock Ridge High School girls swimming coach Perry Brown doesn’t work his team hard before a meet.
On Monday, Brown veered off from that practice and put his team through a grueling workout.
Brown wasn’t sure what kind of effect that was going to have on the Wolverines before their dual meet with Hibbing, but it turned out OK.
Rock Ridge had a strong second half of the meet en route to a 101-84 victory over Bluejackets Tuesday at the Hibbing High School Pool.
That practice was out of the ordinary for Brown.
“I don’t usually like to do that,” Brown said. “.We just did that. We had an open day, and the young kids were gone. They were at a junior high meet in Mesabi East. I took the older kids and beat them up pretty good.
“I thought they would be OK, and that’s what happened. The ones that got hurt Monday did OK today and good enough. The ones who didn’t have it quite as tough of a workout, swam better. We had a good effort. They swam their best times. That was good.”
It also helped that the Wolverines were competing against their rivals from Hibbing.
“They were excited, but I told them, ‘Don’t fool around with Hibbing. They will bite you,’’ Brown said. “You don’t take anything for granted. You don’t take any race for granted. They were expecting to get some good competition, some good races, and they did.
“There were a lot of good races.”
Neither team had a huge advantage through the first three events as Hibbing’s Ginny Sandness, Raini Gibson, Riley St. George and Naomi Ronning won the 200 medley relay in 2:06.10, but Rock Ridge captured the next two events.
Samantha Bartovich won the 200 freestyle in 2:08.65, and Paige Robillard captured the 200 individual medley in 2:32.24.
Gibson would win the 50 freestyle in 26.76, then the Bluejackets started pulling away.
In diving, Hibbing took the top three spots with Evie Renskers winning with 203.75 points. Sylvie Wetzel second and Mallory Seykora was third.
In the 100 butterfly, Gibson won with a time of 1:03.96, and she was followed in by St. George and Jackie Hiltner for another first-, second- and third-place finish.
“We had a lead after diving because our divers did an outstanding job,” Hibbing coach Mike Veneziano said. “Our butterfly swimmers also did a great job with a one, two, three finish. At that point, that put us up by quite a few points.”
Even though his team had the lead, Veneziano know that Rock Ridge had a stronger back end of the meet than his team.
“I knew that the back end, the backstroke, the breaststroke and the last relay, that played into their strong suit,” Veneziano said. “That’s something we’re actively working on, and we’re getting better at it, but it doesn’t match up well.
“The 200 free relay, had we won that, we could have made a little bit closer, but we got touched out there.”
Brown on the other hand knew his team had to start putting good swims together.
“We did have to go,” Brown said. “We were quite a ways behind after the diving, 14 or 13 points. I was a little worried there for a minute.
I didn’t think we’d be that far behind.”
The Wolverines got wins from Amelia Kober in the 100 freestyle (58.93), Bartovich in the 500 freestyle (5:45.39); the 200 freestyle relay team of Allison Anderson, Bartovich, Robillard and Kober (1:50.72); Maggie Gripp in the 100 backstroke (1:17.90); Maddison Husmann in the 100 breaststroke (1:17.90); and 400 freestyle relay team of Anya Schuchard, Maggie Kraushaar, Madelyn Hancock and Abrianna Ferkul (4:34.40).
That was more than enough to pull out the win.
“The gap there, it didn’t come back as fast as I expected it to,” Brown said. “I mentioned to the girls that we should put in a little more effort, and they came around and did it.”
Veneziano is working hard to strengthen the back end of the meets.
“We do well right up to ⅔ of the meet, then we get into our weaker events,” Veneziano said. “I can’t say we’re not working hard and we’re not progressing. When you get into a competition with a team where that’s some of their strong stuff, it looks worse on paper than it does in reality.
“There’s an ebb-and-flow throughout the entire meet. We did OK.”
Rock Ridge 101, Hibbing 84
200 medley relay—1. Hibbing (Ginny Sandness, Raini Gibson, Riley St. George, Naomi Ronning), 2:06.10; 2. Rock Ridge (Maggie Gripp, Maddison Husmann, Anya Schuchard, Amelia Kober), 2:7.61; 3. Hibbing (Gianna Fatticci, Elizabeth Haupt, Jackie Hiltner, Maggie Cary), 2:18.91.
200 freestyle—1. Samantha Bartovich, RR, 2:08.65; 2. Ronning, H, 2:13.71; 3. Madelyn Hancock, RR, 2:25.81.
200 individual medley—1. Paige Robillard, RR, 2:32.24; 2. Gripp, RR, 2:35.21; 3. St, George, H, 2:39.50.
50 freestyle—1. Gibson, H, 26.76; 2. Kober, RR, 26.83; 3. Gabriella Mast, RR, 28.32.
Diving—1. Evie Renskers, H 203.75; 2. Sylvie Wetzel, H, 177.20; 3. Mallory Seykora, H, 161.50.
100 butterfly—1. Gibson, H, 1:03.96; 2. St. George, H, 1:07.60; 3. Hiltner, H, 1:20.02.
100 freestyle—1. Kober, RR, 58.93; 2. Mast, RR, 1:04.43; 3. Fatticci, H, 1:04.89.
500 freestyle—1. Bartovich, RR, 5:45.39; 2. Robillard, RR, 5:49.20; 3. Ronning, H, 6:02.30.
200 freestyle relay—1. Rock Ridge (Allison Anderson, Bartovich, Robillard, Kober), 1:50.72; 2. Hibbing (Gretchen Hoertsch, Gibson, St. George, Ronning), 1:51.62; 3. Rock Ridge (Grace Langowski, Mast, Maggie Kraushaar, Schuchard), 1:57.90.
100 backstroke—1. Gripp, RR, 1:08.85; 2. Anderson, RR, 1:14.20; 3. Sandness, H, 1:15.82.
100 breaststroke—1. Husmann, RR, 1:17.90; 2. Langowski, RR, 1:23.92; 3. Haupt, H, 1:28.76.
400 freestyle relay—1. Rock Ridge (Schuchard, Kraushaar, Hancock, Abrianna Ferkul), 4:34.40; 2. Hibbing (Fatticci, Emily Plombon, Sandness, Hoertsch), 4:36.24; 3. Hibbing (Alyana Schlecht, Hiltner, Grace Hanegmon, Marley Schwerzler), 5:03.30.
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