The Bobcats are now 8-0 in dual meets and have won two invitationals so far in the season.

“It’s nice to go into the break undefeated and have two invite titles,” Marshalltown head coach Mike Loupee said. “It bodes well to the work that we have put in up to this point and it’s also a good confidence boost to the guys. Seven meets before the Christmas break is a lot and the guys have helped up under the workload with practice and then also trying to get up and be at their mental best to compete that many times. They have done an admirable job up to this point.”

In the meet, Marshalltown had eight event winners and swept two individual events and two relays. The Bobcats also swam 52 season bests and 30-lifetime bests in the meet.

“Prefacing, we had a pretty hard week of practice,” Loupee said. “We have been in the water for two-a-days, we have been in the water at 5:45 a.m. a couple of days, we have pounded the end. We had two weight workouts. We really have pounded the yardage. We have been swimming 10,000 yards a day in our doubles so the guys are tired. To be seeing these times [is great].”

T-R PHOTO BY ANDREW ABADIE - Marshalltown’s Brock Keeler competes in the 100-yard breaststroke during Thursday’s CIML Iowa Conference dual against Southeast Polk at the Marshalltown High School pool.

The Bobcats swept the 200-yard freestyle with Carson Beals winning with a time of one minute 52.99 seconds with Nash Perisho and Tyler Downey finishing in second and third with times of 1:53.99 and 1:59.74, respectively.

“I was real pleased with the 200-yard freestyle,” Loupee said. “We went one-two-three. Tyler Downing in [third place] gets under two minutes for the second time in his career so that was great for him.

“Nash Perisho has been ill. He’s been working through some middle ear infection issues and he did not let that bother him in his times tonight and I know the kid is hurting. That’s the kind of team member Nash is.”

Marshalltown also swept the 200-yard individual medley. Marcus Barker won the event with a 2:15.49 while Stephen Blom swam 2:19.60 for second and Ethan Benscoter finishing in third place with a time of 2:21.57.

“Stephen Bloms 2:19 is great,” Loupee said. “He had a nice time drop. Ethan Benscoter had a nice drop [in time].”

T-R PHOTO BY ANDREW ABADIE

Blom also won the 500-yard freestyle with a time of 5:22.95 and Barker won the 100-yard breaststroke with a 1:09.16.

Winning the 50-yard freestyle was Aaron Seberger who swam a 22.82. Seberger also won the 100-yard backstroke with a time of 1:00.98.

“Aaron Seberger had a lifetime best [in the 50-yard freestyle] and there are still some technique things that he can work on,” Loupee said. Seberger had a great swim there.

“I was hoping he was going to stay in the mid-23s so swimming tired and popping that off was really nice.”

Beals and Perisho finished in first and second place in the 100-yard freestyle with times of 50.07 and 51.60, respectively.

T-R PHOTO BY ANDREW ABADIE

Brock Keeler had a notable second-place finish in the 100-yard butterfly in which he swam a time of 1:01.44.

“Another great swim was Brock Keeler in the 100-yard butterfly,” Loupee said. “That is not his event. He hasn’t swam it much. We switched him into it. Nash isn’t feeling well so we pulled him out of the fly.”

“I told Brock right before the meet that I was going to put him in the fly because Nash wasn’t feeling real well and his only response was ‘OK coach’. Those are the kinds of seniors and that’s the kind of leadership you look for and then he raced [because] 1:01 is a real nice time to see.”

Marshalltown also won the 200-yard freestyle relay and 400-yard freestyle relay in which the Bobcats finished in first and second place in both races.

“The coaching staff is content with where we are at now but we realize that we have a lot of work to do to coach these guys,” Loupee said. “We have a long Christmas break. We have 16 practices scheduled so we are going to get a lot of work done over the break.”

Marshalltown will return to action against Mason City on Jan. 8 at 5:30 p.m.

“The game plan right now is pounding it and fixing technique,” Loupee said. We’ll be excited to see what we do when we go to Mason City out of the break.”

Marshalltown 99, Southeast Polk 69

At Marshalltown

EVENT RESULTS

(Champion plus MHS placewinners)

200 MEDLEY RELAY — 1. SEP (Williams, Williams, Davis, Backen) 1:51.39; 2. MHS (Blom, Keeler, Jones, Benscoter) 1:52.16; 4. MHS (Petty, Kodis, Hunter, Barlow) 2:03.03.

200 FREESTYLE — 1. Carson Beals, MHS, 1:52.99; 2. Nash Perisho, MHS, 1:53.99; 3. Tyler Downey, MHS, 1:59.74.

200 INVIDIDUAL MEDLEY — 1. Marcus Barker, MHS, 2:15.49; 2. Stephen Blom, MHS, 2:19.60; 3. Ethan Benscoter, MHS, 2:21.57.

50 FREESTYLE — 1. Aaron Seberger, MHS, 22.82; 4. JP Jones, MHS, 25.68; 5. Carter Hunt, MHS, 25.74.

100 BUTTERFLY — 1. Carson Beals, MHS, 50.07; 2. Nash Perisho, MHS, 51.60; 5. Carter Hunt, MHS, 59.71.

500 FREESTYLE — 1. Stephen Blom, MHS, 5:22.95; 3. Tyler Downey, MHS, 5:36.38; 4. Ethan Benscoter, MHS, 5:50.38.

200 FREESTYLE RELAY — 1. MHS (Beals, Seberger, Barker, Perisho) 1:33.37; 2. MHS (Hunt, Jones, Petty, Downey) 1:43.76.

100 BACKSTROKE — 1. Aaron Seberger, MHS, 1:00.98; 3. Dane Petty, MHS, 1:04.26; 4. Joe Barlow, MHS, 1:09.51.

100 BREASTSTROKE — 1. Marcus Barker, MHS, 1:09.16; 3. Brock Keeler, MHS, 1:10.75

400 FREESTYLE RELAY — 1. MHS (Perisho, Downey, Barker, Beals) 3:34.97; 2. MHS (Seberger, Benscpter, Keeler, Blom) 3:35.28.

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