Newport of Bellevue, Lakeside of Seattle and Pullman kings of WIAA boys swimming

FEDERAL WAY, Wash. – Curtis junior Tolu Young repeated as the 50-yard freestyle champion in Class 4A, setting a state record in the process.

Meet records fell in two of the three state boys swim meets, but Young’s was the only overall state mark to be lowered at King County Aquatic Center on Saturday.

After coming up just five one-hundredths of a second short of the state record during qualifying Friday, Young took another .13 of a second off his own personal best to reset the state mark at 19.73 seconds during the championship finals.

That lowered the record of 19.81 seconds, set by Glacier Peak’s Matt King in 2020.

"I’m surprised I dropped that much," said Young, who came into the state meet with a personal best of 20.41 seconds. "I was really shocked (yesterday) when I went 19.86. And then I managed to get it to that."

Team titles went to Newport of Bellevue in 4A, 268.5-229 over runner-up Curtis; Mercer Island in 3A, 285-246.5 over Lakeside of Seattle for its third consecutive championship; and Pullman in 2A, 286-245 over Anacortes.

In 4A, the Newport 200 medley relay and Curtis 400 free relay teams each eclipsed their own records set just last year. The Knights went 1:32.70 to lower the record from 3:33.06 while the Vikings went 3:04.98 to beat its 3:06.45.

In 2A, Bellingham’s Miles Cratsenberg lowered the 200 free record to 1:37.75 from the 1:38.18 set by Liberty’s Warren Briggs in 2020; Quincy’s Trenton Calloway took a half-second off the 100 butterfly record, going 49.25 seconds to reset the mark of 49.75 set by Holden Ellsworth of Pullman in 2019;

In 3A, the only real suspense came in the final race of the meet, the championship final of the 400 free relay. Just before the relay was run, Mercer Island coach Craig Nisgor commented:

"It’s kind of nice to look up at the board and know you don’t even need this last relay," Islanders coach Craig Nisgor said.

As it turned out, it’s a good thing the Islanders didn’t need it. Though Mercer Island won the final race of the night easily in 3:06.68, it was announced immediately after the race that Lane 5 had been disqualified. Since that was the Islanders, it erased 40 team points and gave Bainbridge the relay title.