By Eliot Schickler

Feb. 4 - Going into its meet at Weston High, the Staples High boys swimming thought it was going to be in a dogfight. And for good reason, Weston won four straight meets going into this renewal of a local rivalry and as the defending Class S champions, it has a formidable lineup to boot.

Much to everyone’s surprise, Staples, who was favored to win a nail-biter, stepped it up and won convincingly, 95-80. The Wreckers’ margin of victory would have been larger if they didn’t swim unofficial in the final three events of the meet (many teams swim unofficial after clinching the victory). With the win, Staples raised its record to 3-3. The Trojans dropped to 5-4.

“I honestly didn’t expect it to play out this way and it was a nice surprise,” said Wreckers coach Jeff Schare. “I expected a much closer meet. We’re just a deep team and took a lot of firsts.”

Staples renewed a rivalry it had with Weston earlier in the decade. The two schools competed against each other in 2002 and 2003 with the home team winning both meets, the Trojans claiming victory in 2002 and the Wreckers triumphing in 2003.

Similar to Schare, the Staples captains didn’t expect to win in a landslide.

“We definitely weren’t expecting to swim as well as we did,” said Wreckers senior quad-captain Stefan Tziolis. “We haven’t swam against Weston in a long time and it was interesting to see how we’d swim against them.”

Opening the meet by finishing one-two in the 200-yard medley relay was a good omen for Staples. Tziolis, junior Trevor Lally, sophomore Cory Bacon and senior quad-captain Jeffrey Helt won the 200-medley relay with a time of 1:48.70, which was the foursome’s fastest time of the year. Senior Brian Rackson and juniors Cameron Bruce, Larry Abel and Mac Mombello took second (1:55.36).

Weston grabbed its only individual win in the 200-yard freestyle behind junior Mike McDonald (1:56.11). Nevertheless the Wreckers went two-three-four with senior quad-captain Nick Pulvino (1:56.72), Abel (2:01.73) and junior Brody McConnell (2:01.96) and won the event, 9-7.

Tziolis (2:08.56) won the 200-yard individual medley and Bacon (2:10.63) took second, beating out Trojan senior co-captain Tyler Loechner (2:10.68), who took third. Bruce (2:18.80) was fourth and Staples won the event, 12-4.

“I swam the IM many times and I worked on my strokes,” said Tziolis. “I improved in the breaststroke and it helped me get a great time today.”

Schare said, “Tyler is a good swimmer and to go one-two-four in the IM is impressive for us.”

Helt (24.03) won the 50-yard freestyle, beating out Weston junior Zane Randell (24.48). Lally (24.79) and Mombello (25.25) were three-four.

“Since it’s a short race, I tried to get my heart rate up before the race and focus on my turns,” said Helt. “Other than that, I try to kick through the race.”

Wrecker sophomore Zach Slater (188.90) won diving and junior teammate Matt Mirkine (136.00) was second, giving Staples a 54-21 lead at that point.

Making this landslide victory more remarkable was that the Wreckers’ best swimmer, senior quad-captain Chris Wiederecht only did one event because he was sick. Wiederecht (54.46) made the most of his opportunity and won the 100-yard butterfly with Bacon (57.02) taking second. Trojan junior Billy Phillips (58.81) and senior teammate Alex Liggett (1:02.00) were three-four.

“I was obviously happy with how it turned out,” said Pulvino. “We went in with a positive attitude and believed we could win it. We did well without Chris even though he’s a big loss, but the relays did well and everyone stepped it up and had a great meet.”

Pulvino (53.07) then won the 100-yard freestyle with his fastest time of the season, touching out Randell (53.28). Freshman Joss Abel (56.0) and sophomore Michael Good-game (56.1) were three-four for Staples.

“I took it out moderately paced and I saved some energy for the end of the race,” said Pulvino.

Tziolis (5:13.43) won the 500-yard free-style with a personal best, beating out McDonald (5:17.15) and Loechner (5:18.76). McConnell (5:19.55) and Larry Abed (5:33.04) were four-five.

“I wanted to get a best time and I was surprised with my time,” said Tziolis. “It was easier than I thought it would be and I was excited to get a best time.”

The Wreckers then clinched the meet by winning the 200-yard freestyle relay (1:38.13) with Pulvino, Mombello, Tziolis and Bacon, giving the team a 95-42 lead. Phillips, McDonald, Loechner and Randell (1:39.93) were second.

Staples then swam unofficial and although its performances didn’t produce any points, its swimmers times count towards qualifying for FCIACs and Class LL. Helt (58.31) and Rackson (1:03.64) had the two fastest times in the 100-yard backstroke. Phillips (1:04.88), who had the third-fastest time, was the official winner.

Lally (1:09.31) had the fastest time of the meet in the 100-yard breaststroke and it was his fastest time of the year. Trojan junior Carl Buttke (1:11.60) touched out Bruce (1:11.67) for the second-fastest time and was the official winner. Liggett (1:11.67) was tied with Bruce and was the official second place finisher.

McDonald, Phillips, Randell and Loechner won the 400-yard freestyle relay (3:38.85).

“This meet meant a lot to the guys because this was the difference between a winning and losing season,” said Schare.

Helt said, “I think we swam well today and we surprised ourselves after tough losses last week. It’s a good turnaround for the season.”

Staples hosts Norwalk today, New Canaan tomorrow and travel to Wilton Monday.

Despite falling short, Loechner was pleased with his team’s performance.

“It was a pretty tough LL school going up against Class S, but I definitely think we held our own. We represented Weston well and didn’t roll over for them.”

Weston hopes to learn from the meet and be a better team because of it. The Trojans host Oxford and New Milford tomorrow and wrap up their dual meet part of the season next Tuesday (Feb. 10) when it hosts vaunted Newtown High.

“Swimming well against such a good team will give us confidence in future meets,” said Loechner. “We’ll go into any meet, knowing we can swim well.”

Reprinted from The Westport News