2/5/12 – Toms River, NJ — Adapted from a story written by Robert Ziegler, Staff Writer for the Asbury Park Press
Heading into Saturday’s Shore Conference Boys Swimming Championships, athletes from Christian Brothers Academy, Ocean and Central were expected to dominate the meet.
And that’s largely how things played out, with CBA capturing its 22nd consecutive team title and Ocean’s Sam Lynch and Central’s Evan Mahoney each winning two individual events for the second consecutive year.
The first event at the Ocean County YMCA rewrote part of the script, however, as Toms River South came from behind to win the 200-yard medley relay in a time of 1:40.70, upsetting CBA and defending champion Ocean.
The Indians were in third and trailed first-place Ocean, which was expected to get off to a quick start behind Lynch and Mark Conte, by 2.28 seconds after the backstroke and breaststroke.
Then Nicholas Yodonis entered the pool. His 23.75 butterfly split, the best of the event by 1.33 seconds, lifted Toms River South in front of CBA and into second place, and Robert Newman’s 22.74 freestyle anchor leg finished off the race. CBA finished second, 25-hundredths of a second behind the Indians and one-hundredth ahead of Ocean.
“We really don’t look to see how far ahead the other teams are,’’ Newman said. “We just go as hard as we can.’’
His butterfly leg of the medley relay was just the first big swim of the night for Yodonis, who later placed second in the 200 individual medley before winning the 100 butterfly in 52.52, despite being the No. 8 seed.
Yodonis had a solid, but unspectacular performance at the Ocean County Championships last month, placing third in both the 50 and 100 freestyles. He said he was sore after some rough practices the week before that meet and it caused him to lose focus. That wasn’t a problem Saturday.
“After we won that (relay) I was so pumped,’’ Yodonis said. “I was really excited, and I just wanted to get after that 2 IM and fly. I just wanted to stay focused and keep it up.’’
CBA outscored second-place Toms River North, 413-209.5 and Toms River South was third with 189 points.