The 2022 Section swimming and diving competition was a contest of personal bests and one state entrant for the Becker Bulldogs.

Last Friday night was the diving competition  and Lauren Woelfel walked away with a second place finish and a trip to the State Meet.  

“She will dive on Wednesday afternoon for the prelims and semi-finals,” Coach Tina Tamm said last week. “If she makes the top 16 she will compete in the finals on Friday afternoon.”

Tamm added that both Karli Kirk and Lillian Bonsante also had a great night of diving with Karli placing 7th and Lillian placing 10th.

In the swimming side of the event, Becker was all about the personal bests for the season.

“We had the Section prelims Thursday night in Sauk Rapids and it was 12 athletes, three relays and 24 individual races,” Tamm said. “Every single one of them was a personal best time.”

After the impressive Thursday results, the swimmers returned to the pool Saturday for the Section Finals.

“We had some more personal best times and walked away with a bunch of medals,” Tamm said.

The 200 Free Relay team of Meghan Swanson, Grace Wynia, Tia Schaap and Grace Mork broke the school record, dropping close to a full second.  

“They just missed a State meet appearance as the second through fifth place finishes for that relay were within 0.3 seconds,” Tamm said.  “It was a crazy race and they just missed it.”

At Saturday’s finals, a number of Bulldogs made the podium, earning a top spot in the Section.

That same relay team that just missed state in the 200 freestyle also made a strong push in the 200 Medley relay, finishing in fifth place.

Mork had a great meet overall, dropping another time in the 200 Freestyle to place seventh, while also taking sixth in the 500 Freestyle.

Laila Cook was also a stellar performer, earning an eighth place finish in both the 200 Individual Medley and the 100 Breaststroke.

Bulldog Delaney Varney was also on top of her performances, netting a fourth place in the 100 Butterfly and an 8th place in the Backstroke.

Overall, Tamm was pleased with how her team performed.

“The girls had a great Section meet and finished the season strong!” said the coach.

Look for complete details of Woelfel’s state tournament competition in next week’s Patriot.