Stars dethrone Jay

The Starfires had to watch each of the last two years as the Patriots celebrated conference championships at their home pool.

This year the trophy is headed to Berne.

The South Adams High School girls swim team set one conference and two school records Saturday, claiming titles in seven events to win the program’s first Allen County Athletic Conference championship in the meet held at Jay County.

“Putting in three years of work for this was pretty grueling and pretty challenging,” said SAHS senior Ashton Klopp, who had two individual victories, including setting a conference and school record in the 500-yard freestyle. “But we kept having the end in mind.

“Three years later we’re finally able to do it. The whole team is on cloud nine, it is awesome. The best thing in swimming is seeing your goals that you’ve worked on for so long be accomplished.”

South Adams scored 428 points to finish first, dethroning two-time defending champion Jay County. The Patriots picked up wins in four events on their way to a runner-up finish with 337 points. Bluffton (297) was third and Adams Central (214) placed fourth.

“We’re very pleased by the results today,” said SAHS coach Andy Lehman, whose girls team had finished second to the Patriots in each of the last two seasons. “We’ve been working hard toward this meet all season.”

Bluffton claimed the boys championship with a score of 466 points. South Adams finished second with 266, Jay County placed third with 243 and Adams Central was fourth with 184.

Matt Slavik, Jay County’s coach, was pleased with how both of his teams did despite the final scores.

“South Adams had a great meet,” he said. “They are a fast team and they have a lot of talent. … At the end of the day I am extremely proud of how our kids did. If I have it figured out, we had 88 percent of our swimmers went best times today. I couldn’t ask for anything better than that.”

Ashton Klopp got her first victory of the day in the 200 freestyle in 1 minute, 58.05 seconds, and then later finished the 500 freestyle in 5:21.86 seconds to beat her own ACAC and school record of 5:24.83.

“I dove in for the 500 and I fully expected it to hurt really bad,” she said, admitting she initially read the scoreboard wrong and didn’t think she broke her record. “I had never been so excited for that to happen.”

Her twin Brette Klopp set a new school record in the 100 backstroke, breaking the 1-minute mark to finish in 59.89 seconds. She also added a first-place finish in the 200 individual medley in 2:16.82.

“I kind of had a sour taste in my mouth with the backstroke,” said Brette. She lost to Jay County’s Elizabeth McDowell during the dual meet earlier this season, but avenged the defeat by beating McDowell by more than five seconds Saturday. “I’ve been working really hard but I haven’t been seeing the improvement that I wanted until today.”

Ashley LeFever earned the only other individual conference championship for the Starfires, winning the 100 freestyle in 54.77 seconds.

Brette Klopp, Audrey Burson, Ashton Klopp and LeFever combined to win the 200 medley relay in 1:51.59. Caroline Kloepper joined LeFever and the Klopp twins to win the 400 freestyle relay in 3:48.07.

Jay County’s Alex Bader claimed ACAC titles in both the 50 freestyle and 100 butterfly. Her time of 24.22 seconds in the 50 freestyle was two-tenths of a second off the conference record held by her cousin and current Ball State University Cardinal, Anne Vormohr. Bader also won the 100 butterfly in 59.76 seconds before teaming with Elizabeth McDowell, Vivienne Kunkler and Erica Hathaway to give JCHS the title in the 200 freestyle with a time of 1:44.29.

Jamie Valentine led yet another strong Jay County effort in the breaststroke, winning the event in 1:12.34.

“As was a common theme this year, breaststroke, man,” Slavik said. JCHS sophomore Vivienne Kunkler was second behind Valentine, and freshman Emma James placed sixth. “There was sixth-tenths of a second separating first and third. Clutch win in that event.”

In the boys competition, SAHS junior Zach Colpaert set new conference records in the 50 and 100 freestyle races. Colpaert won the 50 freestyle in 22.26 seconds to beat the previous record held of 22.8, held by Bluffton’s Jacob Ehle. Colpaert then had a time of 50.03 seconds to beat 2016 SAHS graduate Daniel Steffen’s mark of 50.47. Bluffton’s Walker Lees also beat Steffen’s time, but touched the wall moments behind Colpaert to be denied the championship and the conference record.

Zach Teeple gave South Adams the conference title in the 200 IM with a time of 2:12.57.

Jay County got a pair of individual victories from Christopher McDowell, who also helped a winning relay team. McDowell earned titles in the 200 freestyle (1:57.86) and 500 freestyle (5:22.21). The junior joined Tayler Smeltzer, Ian Reynolds and Garrett Campbell for a victory in the 200 freestyle relay with a time of 1:36.95.