The Pine Bush girls’ swim team set one new meet record and won three individual events and two relays on its way to a first-place finish at the Section 9 girls swimming and diving championships from Thursday until Saturday at Valley Central High School.

Pine Bush finished with 355 points, while Valley Central took fifth with 189.

The Vikings qualified a relay team for the state championship meet, as well.

During the preliminary heat, Pine Bush’s 200-yard medley relay team of Samantha Hufcut, Mackenzie Gula, Antonia Licardi and Elishka Hajek set a new meet record with their time of 1:48.47, but even so their time of 1:49.18 on Saturday was good enough for a first-place finish.

Hajek won the 50-yard freestyle, nearly matching her already state-qualifying time. She finished Saturday with a 24.35 in the finals. Antonia Licardi, who had already qualified for states prior to the meet, finished second in 24.59.

Valley Central’s Allison Armistead, who also previously qualified for the state meet, finished fourth in 24.86.
Licardi had already qualified for the state championships in the preliminary swim of the 100-yard freestyle, but she dropped her time by nearly a full second coming into the finals to win the sectional title in 53.14.

Hajek, who had previously qualified, finished second in 53.33.
Pine Bush’s 200-yard freestyle relay team came into the meet already qualified for the state championships and the team of Hajek, Cora Mance, Gula and Licardi won the event by 2 seconds with a time of 1:39.02.

Valley Central’s team of Rian Dickman, Naihomy Garcia, Grace Wienchowski and Allison Armistead qualified for states in the prelims and finished second in the finals with a time of 1:41.02. They swam a 1:40.72 on Thursday.

Hufcut entered the meet already qualified for the state championships in the 100-yard backstroke and finished second on Saturday with a time of 1:00.01.

Gula, who had previously qualified for states in the 100-yard breaststroke finished seventh, about 2 seconds off her best time.

Pine Bush’s 400-yard freestyle relay team entered the meet already qualified for the state championships. The team of Samantha McKee, Licardi, Hufcut and Madaghan O’Shea finished third with a time of 3:41.31.

The New York State Public High School Athletic Association championship meet is scheduled for Nov. 22 and 23 at Ithaca College.