Miller, Sherpa, Edwards win WPIAL titles
Catherine Miller of Upper St. Clair and Rinzen Sherpa from Mt. Lebanon are on opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to swimming experience, but they are on the same side of winning.
Miller and Sherpa along with Bethel Park’s Jackson Edwards captured their first individual WPIAL titles during the first day of competition in the Class 3A championship meet held Feb. 26 at the University of Trees Pool.
Miller won the 100-yard butterfly event. A freshman, who only started swimming three years ago, grabbed the gold by edging out Eva Ogden, a senior from North Allegheny, by five one-hundreds of a second. Miller’s winning time was 56.21
“Anytime a freshman can come in and win an event at WPIAL’s it’s a big deal,” said USC skipper Dave Schraven. “She actually came to swimming late. When she was 11, which is kind of late, for somebody at her level.
“Catherine’s a fighter. Super competitive and a hard worker,” Schraven continued. “You could see that in her last 25 yards and she got her hand to the wall first. So it was a great race for her.”
Sherpa clocked a 1:51.05 to slip past Central Catholic’s Cinco Perez (1:51.79) and claim the gold medal in the 200 individual medley. A junior, Sherpa used his signature swim, the breaststroke to pull away from the field and finish strong during the final leg, the freestyle. The IM includes a lead-off butterfly leg and the backstroke in the second segment.
“I just tried to build momentum into that (breast) leg and finish it with my freestyle,” said Sherpa. “I wanted to be a little faster but I can’t be too mad with that.
“It feels pretty good to win a WPIAL title,” he continued. “I’ve wanted one of those since my freshman year. So, I’m stoked it’s happening.”
Sherpa started swimming seven years ago. His dad took him to the Jewish Community Center “all the time” and then one of the coaches there noticed his talent and invited him to join the local swim team.
“I said yes and I’ve been swimming ever since,” he said. “I really enjoy it. To be honest, I don’t really care about the time, but, you know, I’m just trying to have fun racing the other guys and they’re all really good.”
When Jackson burst onto the scene several seasons ago, he was best at the backstroke, setting new standards as a freshman for Bethel Park High School. Today, he’s pretty good at the butterfly. A junior, Jackson coasted to victory in 48.97, a scant .55 off the All-America standard, and ahead of the second-place mark of 49.26 secured by North Allegheny’s Mason Shantz.
Jackson helped BP’s medley relay team of Caden Powell, TJ Strock and Connor Blocklin to the bronze medal and the 200 free relay team of Blocklin, Charlie Werts and Strock to a seventh-place showing.
At the end of the first day of competition, the North Allegheny boys and girls held commanding leads in the team standings with 287 and 279 points respectively.
Sherpa and Edwards had the Blue Devils and Black Hawks in contention for the runner-up trophy with scores of 128 and 100, but they are also battling Upper St. Clair, which had a 134-point score.
Leading the way for the Panthers were Nazar Zoukovski and Ben Whiteford. They combined with Danis Vakufac and Tom Howard for second place in the medley relay behind NA (1:31.12). USC was .57 off the pace. The same foursome also finished second to NA in the 200 free relay.
Individually, Zoukovski took third in the 50 free. His time of 20.55 was .29 off the pace of Dom Davis from Mars and .03 behind NA’s Zachary Tobin.
Vakufac reached the podium for the Panthers with sevenths respectively in the 200 IM while Jack Whiteford picked up 11th place. Seth Pedretti was 14th in the 200 free.
“We don’t have a ton of depth,” Schraven said. “They swam really well today.”
William Thomas from Mt. Lebanon was runner-up to Thomas Westerman from Franklin Regional in the 200 free. Thomas posted a 1:41.59 time. Winning time was 1:40.91.
Lebo’s Thomas Vilardaga followed Thomas in seventh. Noah Loboda was seventh in the 50 free.
Other individual medal winners on the first day of competition included: Ava Komoroski, third in the 50 free; Isaac Lee, sixth in the 50 free; Wyatt Stetor, fourth, 200 IM; all from Peters Township as well as South Fayette’s Macy Koerner, who added a seventh in the 100 fly.
Top relay teams included:
Michael Zhu, Noah Loboda, Thomas Vilardaga, William Thomas; third, 200 free
Wyatt Stetor, Lukas Hartman, Ryan Smith and Logan Hartman, fourth for Peters Township
Rinzen Sherpa, Michael Zhu, Matthew Burton, Lee Campbell, seventh for Lebo, medley.
Abby Poe, Cloey Barnes, Macy Koerner and Carrie Fisher, sixth for South Fayette.
Lillian Evan, Clara Shellenberger, Leah Werzyn, Sarah Albu, seventh, for Lebo
Visit www.wpial.org for complete results.