Swimming wins SEC/County Championships behind Record Setting Performances

The SHP Swimming Team won the Super Essex Conference and Essex County Championships on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day at the Jersey Aquatic Center in New Providence. Story provided by Head Coach Joe Alexander:

The Pirates scored 319 points, with runner-up Newark Academy at 182 and third place Columbia at 151.  It was a grand day as SHP won 8 first place finishes out of the 11 events. 

Senior Co-Captains Richard Poplawski and Cormac Rouse were each double individual event champions, with Poplawski winning the 100 Butterfly (48.92) and 100 Backstroke (50.97) and Rouse the 50 Freestyle (21.61) and 100 Freestyle (47.85).

Poplawski's Butterfly was both a new meet record and a new school record, smashing his own previous school record of 50.16 from the 2021-22 season and the previous meet record  of 50.24 by Millburn's Ben Lin from 2013. 

SHP's fifth individual event champion was junior Connor O'Neill in the 200 IM at 1:59.84, his first time under the 2 minute mark!

The Pirates also won all three relays, and both freestyle relays were record breakers. The 200 Free Relay of Richard Poplawski, junior Karl Burghardt, senior Aryan Kapoor, and Cormac Rouse won in 1:26.71, easily breaking the previous meet record of 1:28.76 set by the 2020 SHP four of Jack Devilbiss, Dylan Negron, Matt Prior, and Mike Pietrucha, but a mere .01 under the previous school record set by Jaeden Yburan, Matt Prior, Luke Shea, an Roo Fenton in 2019. 

The 400 Free Relay of Rouse, senior Owen Ripley, Kapoor, and Poplawski set a new meet record in 3:12.22, which topped the 3:13.43 set by the 2022 SHP Relay, which featured Kapoor, Poplawski, and Rouse along with Connor Townson.  The 200 Medley Relay of Burghardt, O'Neill, senior Pat Miller, and Kapoor also took gold in 1:40.03.  

 

Richard Poplawski's outstanding performance earned him the Cullen Jones Award as the meet's Most Valuable Swimmer.  This is his second time winning this award, as he also won in 2022.  

 

Other SHP medalists today included:

 

Owen Ripley, 2^nd in the 200 Free and 3^rd in the 500 Free;

Connor O'Neill, 3^rd in the 100 Breast in addition to his IM title;

Junior Kyle Phillips, 3^rd in the 200 Freestyle and 4^th in the 500 Freestyle;

Pat Miller, 4^th in both the 100 Butterfly and the 100 Backstroke;

Junior George Peralvo, 4^th in the 200 Freestyle

Karl Burghardt, 5^th  in both the 200 IM and the 100 Backstroke;

Freshman Ryan Pelosi, 6^th in the 100 Freestyle.