Seeing as The News Journal is publishing the Swimming Honor Roll this year, as well as the availability of the lists at delawaresports.com, I have decided to do away with trying to keep an up-to-date top 5 list.
Anyway, some thoughts:
St. Andrew's boys only beat Tatnall by 4 points, and while Tatnall does have a few strong swimmers, they tend to not be a very deep team, leading me to believe St. Andrew's is also not very deep, so do they deserve the #5 ranking from The News Journal?
And things are getting interesting in the Blue Hen Conference. Brandywine lost to Mount Pleasant, who I believe I heard lost to Newark (I didn't see results, but I seem to remember hearing they had a close meet but lost), but now Brandywine has handed Newark its first loss of the season. And, although St. Mark's isn't in the BHC, they beat Mt. Pleasant and Brandywine, but lost to Newark. So, from the looks of it, those teams should have a very interesting matchup going into States this year, sounds like it will be an exciting meet.
As for The News Journal's top 5 teams, Sallies definitely looks to be the real #1 thus far, AI belongs ahead of Charter, with no one between, but should they be 2-3 or 3-4? It is tough to tell, with Archmere swimming a limited schedule, their two strongest wins being St. Andrew's and Tatnall. However, this again comes down to a question of depth. From the newspaper, and from what I am assuming they make their top 5 choices on, all that is seen is the first place swimmers in each event. While both St. Andrew's and Archmere have some very fast swimmers, what happens past the first place finishes? Is there a drop off? And possibly more importantly, can they have 3 strong relays at once, with the event limitations? Archmere swims Sallies in one week, maybe then we can have a better idea as to what depth they have by seeing how close they can pull to Sallies. No matter what, this year's state meet is looking to be a good one, even if Sallies can take first without too many issues, the battles for the rest of the places should be interesting, with Charter and AI having a close meet, Archmere and St. Andrew's with some high expectations, and Newark, Brandywine, Mt. Pleasant, and St. Mark's having an interesting combination of wins and losses leaving us with little idea as to who is the strongest team of that group. Only time will tell.
Any thoughts?
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yeah i see how you are recording the strengths or newark, charter, and mount pleasant in the blue hen conference. but you forget to mention the fact that middletown has a strong team. they may not will much but they have a good amount of really good swimmers, there roster just isn't deep enough. and if you question middletowns strength, the lost to newark by one point in there first meet of the season, lost to mt pleasant but 6. and also hung around with charter for most of the meet. they got a win over concord, and had a strong meet against st. andrews losing by only 12 and losing all three relays. i think other teams then just the top 3 should be mentioned
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