Splashing into the state meet

The roar at a local Culver’s restaurant was understandable.

Grafton High School junior swimmer Todd O’Connor found out he qualified for the Division 2 state meet in the 50 and 100-yard freestyle races.

Results were posted online. O’Connor said he kept refreshing the website “at least, like, 20” times to see if he made it. He and his teammates celebrated the instant he learned that he made it.

“It has been my goal and I finally did it,” he said.

O’Connor was fourth in the 50 in 22.46 seconds at Saturday’s Ashwaubenon sectional and seventh in the 100 in 49.68 seconds. Both are career bests.

He said he was confident he would qualify after looking at last year’s results

“My times were pretty far ahead of the lowest times,” he said.

O’Connor doesn’t come into Friday’s Division 2 state meet at Waukesha South as a favorite, but he will relish the experience.

“I’m just going to try to have fun. I’m not looking to podium this year,” he said.

Grafton coach Bailey Bodart said O’Connor’s times dropped at a meet before the season started after he rested. After months of training throughout the year, some more rest helped bring his times down at sectionals.

“Under 50 seconds in the 100, that’s always a good mark,” Bodart said.

O’Connor will be joined by Grafton senior diver Tristan Sohr, who finished second at the sectional with a career-best 308.1 points.

He comes into Friday as the fifth seed of 14 divers.

Port Washington divers Conner Cowen and Cory Riel are joining him. While the two schools are rivals, diving is different.

“Everyone in diving is just nice,” Sohr said.

Cowen, who has played other contact sports, said diving’s unique atmosphere endears him more to it.

“Everyone just smiles and high-fives each other no matter how you do. It’s pretty cool,” he said. “It’s all friendly at the end of the day.”

Cowen finished sixth of seven divers at the sectional with 225.65 points. Riel had 196.65.

Since there are only 14 divers in Division 2, all the three had to do was complete their dives to qualify for state.

That still takes concentration.

“If you’re not focused on it, you could screw something up. You could honestly hurt yourself, and you might not be gong to state,” Sohr said.

To prepare, he listens to music to pump himself up on the way to the meet. Once he’s on the board, his mindset changes.

“Blank mind,” he said. “The whole room goes quiet. You have to zone out. If you’re thinking too hard, you’ll think too much on one aspect and screw up the other aspects.”

Cowen said he just focuses on a straight entry.

Dennis Hubert, who has been coaching diving for 41 years and now leads the Port, Grafton and Cedarburg teams, said his rookie divers have made strides.

“For first-year beginners, they’ve learned a lot in the last 13 weeks,” he said.

Hubert teaches the skills, and the divers choose their dives. Sohr and Cowen have more than 10 from which to pick.

Regardless of how the state meet goes, it has already been a successful season “in that they learned a lot,” Hubert said.

Grafton scored 208 points and finished fifth in the sectional, up from eighth last year.

“I was very pleasantly surprised,” Bodart said.

Defending state champ Cedarburg won with 347 points. Ashwaubenon had 313, Plymouth had 241 and Sturgeon Bay Co-op had 219.

Port was ninth of 11 teams with 118 points.

For Grafton, senior Lance Greicar was sixth in the 100 backstroke in 1:05.89 and eighth in the 200 individual medley in 2:21.57. Both were personal records.

“I’m always happy to see a senior do well in his last meet,” Bodart said.

The 400 freestyle relay of Gabe Salko, Greicar, Charles Rose and O’Connor was sixth in 3:37.61.

Salko was seventh in the 200 freestyle in 2:02.42, and the 200 freestyle relay of Salko, Chase Mueller, Andrew Slagter and O’Connor was seventh in 1:39.84.

The 200 medley relay of Greicar, Slager, Ian Mitchell and Rose was eighth in 1:54.56. Mitchell was ninth in the 100 butterfly in 1:05.04, and Slagter was 10th in 1:08.09. He was also 10th in the 100 breaststroke in 1:10.13.

For Port, Jack Sickles was second in the 100 backstroke in 59.69 and sixth in the 500 freestyle in 5:19.69.

The 400 freestyle relay of Tim Zeien, Ben Falkenberg, Finn Ritter and Sickles was ninth in 3:48.19. Elliot Hadacek was 10th in the 200 individual medley in 2:36.23.