Jay claims two top seeds

In two events on Saturday, the field will be chasing a swimmer from Jay County.
Sok Vormohr and James Keen each swam to the top seed in the sectional preliminaries on Thursday.
The sectional meet resumes at 9 a.m. Saturday with diving preliminaries, and the finals will begin at 1 p.m.
Vormohr turned in a career-best time of 49.8 seconds in the 100-yard freestyle to earn the top seed for Saturday.
“That’s what he said he wanted to do,” said JCHS coach Barry Weaver, whose team will be represented in the championship heat in nine of the 11 swimming events. South Adams will participate in the finals of seven events. “That’s been one of his goals when he kind of got serious about the freestyle. I’m impressed. That’s really super for him.
“He said he wanted to get under 50 (seconds), and by golly he did it.”
Vormohr, who is also seeded fourth in the 200 individual medley with his time of 2 minutes, 10.74 seconds, said he is confident he can beat the 50-second mark in the finals on Saturday.
After a disappointing fourth seed in the 50 freestyle, Keen swam to a time of 55.06 seconds and will be the one to beat in the 100 backstroke. Keen, a senior, is the defending sectional champion in the event, and is seeded 0.63 seconds ahead of Logan Ackley of Norwell.
“That swim tonight was the perfect swim that he needed to have — just enough to get seeded first yet he didn’t really spend much,” said Weaver. “He was just getting through it and that’s what he needed to do. His ultimate goal is to be scoring at the state meet in the backstroke. That’s always been his favorite event.”
Keen and Vormohr joined Connor Daniels and Cody White in the 400 freestyle relay, finishing with a time of 3:26.28 to earn the No. 2 seed. White, Keen and Vormohr teamed with 2014 JCHS graduate Josh Lykins to win the sectional crown a year ago, and Weaver is hopeful they can do it again this year with the addition of Daniels.
“That was a good swim for them,” he said. “Hopefully that will be a good race for us on Saturday.”
White will swim in the championship heats of the 200 and 500 freestyle, for which he is seeded fifth (1.56.66) and seventh (5:29.41) respectively.
Daniels just missed the finals of the 50 freestyle with his time of 23.94 seconds. He’ll be the ninth seed on Saturday, a mere 0.11 seconds behind the eighth-seeded Chase Clasby of Muncie Central.
The JCHS junior freestyler will compete in the finals of the 200 medley and 200 freestyle relays, which are seeded fourth and sixth respectively. He’ll join Ian Bentz, Keen and Vormohr in the medley relay, and Travis Barton, White and Bentz in the 200 freestyle.
David Steffen and Daniel Burson led South Adams to its highest seed heading into Saturday’s finals. Along with Jesse Sutton and Xavier Rupp, the quartet is seeded second in the 200 freestyle relay with its time of 1:36.16. Burson, Steffen and Sutton then teamed with Zach Colpaert to earn a fifth seed in the 400 freestyle (3:38.97).
Individually, Steffen is behind Vormohr in both the 100 freestyle and 200 IM. He will be second in the former with his time of 50.24 seconds, and is fifth in the latter with a time of 2:11.4.
Daniel Burson is fourth and sixth respectively in the 500 and 200 freestyle races, and that comes after the second heat of the 500 freestyle — the heat Burson eventually won with a time of 5:22.94 — was interrupted by a fire alarm.
Drew LeFever recovered from falling off the block at the start of the 50 freestyle — his time of 25.51 is the 16th seed — to earn a third seed in the 100 butterfly (55.59).
With his Starfire squad competing in the finals of seven events, SAHS coach Andy Lehman was able to leave the pool pleased.
“When we looked at our seedings of where we are and where we hoped to be, that’s right about where we wanted to be going into Saturday,” he said. “We are walking away very happy tonight.”
Swimming in the consolation finals for Jay County are Christopher McDowell (ninth – 500 freestyle, 13th – 200 freestyle), Ian Reynolds (14th – 100 backstroke), Travis Barton (13th – 100 butterfly, 14th – 200 IM), Ian Bentz (11th – 100 breaststroke, 14th – 50 freestyle) and Thomas Boozier (13th – 100 breaststroke).
Competing for South Adams in the consolation heat are Zach Teeple (ninth – 100 backstroke, 13th – 200 IM), Sutton (ninth – 200 freestyle), Brayden Collingsworth (12th – 500 freestyle), and the 200 medley relay team (Teeple, Collingsworth, Rupp and Colpaert – ninth).