Every team wants their final home competition of the season to be a memorable one for the team’s seniors, and this season’s senior night was a success for the Bobcat swimmers and divers!

Senior night was February 17 against the Riverside panthers.

The meet resulted in a win for the Bobcat girls and an unfortunate loss for the Bobcat boys.

Before the meet officially began the five senior swimmers and diver were honored and celebrated.

Seniors and girls’ swim team captains Emma Schaller and Hannah Hartle along with dive team captain and swimmer Nate Grundberg were all recognized for their four years on the team, many accomplishments in and out of the pool, and they shared their plans for the future.

Tears were shed but more smiles were shared when all of the seniors and their teammates realized that this was their last home meet ever.

Along with Schaller, Hartle, and Grundberg seniors Mya Ramer and Cole Cicozzi were honored with the traditional bouquet of flowers and celebratory posters hung in the hallway as well as all around the pool deck. Though they were not able to swim this year Cicozzi and Ramer will be greatly missed by their teammates after graduation.

Honoring seniors wasn’t the evening’s only celebration. In December the swim and dive team members participated in the first annual Swim-A-Thon where someone was always swimming or diving in every lane of the pool. The swimmers swam over ten thousand yards (roughly six miles) to raise money to benefit the Women’s Shelter of Beaver County.

The Swim-A-Thon raised $900 for the shelter. The team captains presented a check to a representative from the shelter at Senior night.

In the pool, just the second event of the meet, and in her second to last chance ever, Schaller made the WPIAL cut in the 200 yard freestyle event by less than a tenth of a second.

After the meet, the swimmers participated in the annual Buck-A-Duck fundraiser where thousands of plastic and rubber ducks are dumped into the pool. The swim team members then dive off the diving board grabbing ducks to decide who wins the donated gift baskets.

Overall, the teams had a wonderful meet, and the girls defeated Riverside 86-65 in one of their closest meets of the season.

With a season record of 7–4 the girls swim team had their first winning season in over four years.

Though the odds were greatly stacked against them the Bobcat boys still put everything in the pool but still were conquered by the Panthers 101-67.

This ended the boys season with a record of 5–6.

Just two days after Senior night the swimmers traveled to North Allegheny High School to attend their last chance to earn any WPIAL cuts.

At North-A the Bobcats earned two new cuts with junior and team captain Brandon Osbourne getting the WPIAL 100 yard butterfly cut and the boys 200 yard freestyle relay team receiving the needed time.

The boys’ 200 and 400 yard freestyle relays and Schaller in her 200 will continue training for two weeks in preparation for the WPIAL competition at the University of Pittsburgh March 3 and 5.

Check the next BASD ECHO for a swim season wrap up as well as the results from the WPIAL championship.