In what has been an incredible day of high school swimming (even outshining the pros swimming at the Grand Prix in Columbia), we roll on to Georgia, where today marked the prelims of their high school state championship meet.
There, Georgia commit Matias Koski snuck under the old State Record in the boys’ 500 free. He swam a 4:19.11 to take the top seed (by 16 seconds), and sneak under a two-year old State High School Record. The holder of that record was Will Freeman, with whom Koski will become a teammate next fall. The Georgia men’s distance crew is going to be absolutely unbelievable – and the best part is that Koski can really swim any freestyle race from 50 to the mile. He also swam the top seed in the 200 free in 1:38.27. He also anchored the Northview High School 400 free relay in 44.26, and split a 22.97 on the fly leg of the medley.
Meanwhile, nearby in Nashville, Maclin Davis was going after his 46.64 National High School Record that he swam in prelims earlier in the day.
The Tennessee State Meet is a bit unique in that they swim the first half of prelims on Friday morning, then swim the finals of those same events that evening. They then finish the meet on Saturday in the same format. (Most states simply swim through the whole meet prelims one day, and finals the next).
Davis wasn’t able to quite match his earlier swim, but he did still post a huge 46.72 in the finals. That gives him the only two swims in the history of high school swimming under 47-seconds.
He also split a 21.03 in the 50 fly on the Montgomery Bell Academy’s winning 200 medley relay. The quartet of Chatham Dobbs, Andrew Dobbs, Davis, and Cornett tied their own State Record in 1:30.96 that they set in 2010. Davis will finish the meet with the 100 free, and the 400 free relay on Saturday.
Other big swims in the finals include a 1:38.0 from Bearden High School junior Evan Pinion in the 200 free. He’s going to be a huge catch in next year’s recruiting class. In the men’s 200 IM, Baylor School senior Christian Carbone won the 200 IM in 1:48.62. He’s part of a monster Harvard recruiting class, and that time will put him immediately into the school’s top-8 all-time swimmers.