Next weekend’s District XI Swimming and Diving Championships will be awash in a myriad of school colors, and Whitehall head coach Pete Rile would like to see a bigger concentration of maroon and gold among that group.

As it stands right now, the Whitehall girls have four guaranteed spots, while the boys will have two when the event begins on March 1. The girls also have four swimmers who are on the cusp with consideration times, while the boys have two who fall into that category.

While Martha Giletto and Daniel Jablonski have qualified for a number of events, Rile said that each swimmer is allowed to swim two races at the D-11 AAA Championships.

Giletto will be swimming in the 100 and 200 freestyle races. She will be joined by fellow teammate Callie Lyle who will be swimming the 100 butterfly and 100 backstroke. Madelyn Kutney will compete in the 100 and 200 freestyle events, while Lindsay Solderitch will be appearing in the 100 breaststroke.

For the boys, Jablonski, who could have opted for a number of events, will be looking to make it to states in the 200 and 500 freestyle. Nik Martinovic will be at the Championships as well, competing in the 100 freestyle and 100 backstroke.

Rile’s hope is that they’ll be joined by some other Whitehall swimmers who can slide into spots based on the next best times among the remaining slots in each race. He said they’ve all had good qualifying times and he’s eager to see what happens when the final cuts are made.

“We’re aiming to get about eight girls [total] into the race,” said Rile.

Tuesday morning brought good news with Rile being informed that the D-11 Championships will indeed be ablaze with more maroon and gold.

Also qualifying for the girls are Lexi Bartosh in the 200 and 100 freestyle, Rachael Alulis in the 200 Individual Medley and 500 freestyle, Solderitch in the 50 freestyle, Rachel Dolan in the 100 butterfly, and Trish Bartosh in the 100 backstroke.

The boys will be further represented by Connor Barnes in the 200 and 500 freestyle.

The girls will be heading into the Championships after completing an outstanding season. It wrapped up Saturday with a win over William Allen. They finished the year at 12-4.

The boys also defeated the Canaries to end their season at 7-9. Rile said that the boys season was a bit bittersweet since they were without a full complement of swimmers for a huge chunk of the season and still remained competitive throughout the year. They were four points short against Moravian, and also lost a close match to Pocono Mountain East early in the season when their numbers were lacking. Still, he was still impressed with how the boys performed this season, coming together to almost pull to their record to .500.

The girls performed like a well-oiled machine. They won close meets against Freedom and Northampton, and relied on strong senior leadership throughout the year to help pull them through a rugged Eastern Pennsylvania Conference schedule. Still, Rile said that he was somewhat surprised at their final mark.

“They took a couple of more meets than I expected,” said Rile.

It was a good surprise, a year in which Rile said that both his teams exceeded expectations.

“It was a bit of overachieving,” he said.

To their credit, it was an overachievement by a gritty bunch of overachievers. Rile said that a number of factors played a role in that success for the girls. They had a strong core group of senior leaders, leading a talented roster who rose to the occasion in those close meets. Rile said that their ability to plug in swimmers where points were critical helped them win those contested races.

“We had decent depth across the board, and that really helped,” said Rile.

With the season now over, everyone will be aiming to make it to states, and next weekend’s District 11 Championships will hopefully open that door for a number of swimmers.