On Tuesday, Jan. 23, the Northampton swim team welcomed Nazareth High School. In the 10th of 13 meets this season, the Northampton team achieved a mix of close calls and strong second-place finishes, resulting in both the boys and girls being bested by Nazareth by scores of 53-130 and 80-130, respectively.

While this meet presented some challenges and close finishes, Northampton still touts a winning season with the boys 8-2 and the girls 7-3.

First place finishes were sparse on Tuesday night, with the sole golds being achieved by Ryan Franke in the 200 individual medley event.

Strong swims, however, were the flavor of the night, with great showings from all the relay teams, several personal bests achieved, and multiple close races. Northampton’s Josiah Hippert was just edged out in the 100 backstroke event, falling to Nazareth’s Ian Barrey by three-hundredths of a second. Other photo finishes included Stephen Carrasco’s second-place finish in the 50 freestyle and Tobias Scott’s 2nd place finish in the 100 freestyle. In both races, Northampton fell short of first place by just about a second.

In the relay events, Northampton took second place in each of the 6 relay races.

The closest contest for the girls came in the 200 freestyle relay, with Northampton’s team of Ava Allusio, Ava Keenan, Gigi Esteban, and Gabriella Oswald taking second to Nazareth by only a few seconds. For the boys, two exciting relay events played out on Tuesday night. In the 200 freestyle relay, the team of Ryan Franke, Stephen Carrasco, Tobias Scott, and Logan Saylor placed second to Nazareth by less than a second. In the last event of the evening, the 400 freestyle relay, the team of Josiah Hippert, Nick Isaac, Logan Saylor, and Ethan Brobst took the silver again, also reaching the wall just about a second after the Nazareth team.

While Northampton head coach Cullen Mentzell can point to a few items on which the team will focus for the coming week, he is still extremely satisfied with what the team has achieved.

“The thing I’m happiest about is their effort,” explained Mentzell. “The team has stepped up to the challenge of swimming new events and really worked hard during practice.”

After a rough schedule last week with missed practices and delayed meets due to weather the team is back on track this week and hoping the worst of winter is behind them.

On Tuesday, Jan. 30, the Northampton team will welcome Stroudsburg High School’s swim team for a 5 p.m. start. This meet is the last home swim meet of the season for Northampton and is also “Senior Night” where the team will celebrate their senior class swimmers.