It was a wonderful end to a wonderful Bobcat swimming season!

The WPIAL Swimming Championships were held March 2 and 3 at the University of Pittsburgh, and this marked the end of the 2022-23 season for most Bobcat swimmers.

These two days of racing is when the 24 fastest swimmers in western Pennsylvania go head to head.

In swimming there are only two classes, 2A and 3A, so the Bobcats swimmers go against schools in 2A ranging from West Allegheny to Southside.

On day one there were three races for Beaver Area starting off with the Boys 200 yard Medley Relay.

This relay finished in 22nd place and a time of 1:53.66.

Senior Reed Garrett led off swimming backstroke, junior Graham Lovra swam breaststroke, senior Jameson Bonnar was on butterfly, and senior and team captain Robert Cestra anchored freestyle.

Senior and team captain Brandon Osborne then swam the 200 yard individual medley.

Osborne narrowly missed the podium with a ninth place finish and a time of 2:02.17.

The final race of the day was the 200 yard freestyle relay. Garret, Lovra, Cestra, and Osborne earned a 14th place finish with a time of 1:35.38.

Day two of WPIAL was even more eventful then the first.

The Bobcats had both Lovra and Osborne in the 100 yard breaststroke as the first races of the day.

Lovra finished at 24th place with a time of 1:07.00.

Osborne broke the school record for the third time in this event with a final time of 1:00.32 and a fourth place podium finish.

The boys 400 freestyle relay with Garrett, Lovra, Cestra, and Osborne swam a time of 3:30.28 earning 15th place.

This 15th place finish would have qualified the relay for states in previous years, but the relay did not make it to the PIAA championships this year because the WPIAL has become more competitive.

Just a few weeks later on March 15 and 16 Osborne competed at the PIAA swimming state championships.

March 15 was dedicated to the 200 yard individual medley for Osborne. He ended his season in the IM with a final time of 2:01.50 and receiving an 18th place finish, this time sadly did not let him move onto finals.

This new time was a new school record and Osborne’s second, previously beating Cameron Clerici’s record from 2012.

The next day was Osborne’s best event, the breaststroke. He swam in the preliminary round and finished with an impressive 10th place finish and a time of 59.50 (another school record!) qualifying him for the finals later that night.

At finals Osborne finished 12th in the state.

“All my hard work over the last years came together, and I came out of it with two new school records,” Osborne explained.

Middle school swimming will begin in April.