After the NJSIAA Boys’ Championship, also known as Preps, ended, many of Oratory’s swimmers wrapped up their high school season. However, a select few individuals qualified for the Meet of Champions. This event is known as one of the most competitive meets in the state since it is open to all New Jersey high school athletes who can make the qualifying time. With that being said, a total of 124 teams competed in the 11 events available. Oratory’s team of Henry Crowther, Charlie Kline, Paul Knecht, and Jonathan Peterson, along with their alternate Brody Henderson, performed very well with multiple school records and high placements.
The events that the team qualified for are the following: the 200 Medley Relay, Henry Crowther in the 200 Freestyle, 100 Freestyle, and 50 Freestyle, Paul Knecht in the 100 Butterfly, 200 Freestyle Relay, and the 400 Freestyle Relay. To start off the event, The 200 Medley Relay of Paul Knecht, doing backstroke, Charlie Kline, doing breaststroke, Henry Crowther, doing fly, and Jonathan Peterson, doing freestyle. The team dropped 1.22 seconds and re-broke the broken school record at Preps. This time of 1:38.52 gave Oratory 18th place out of 49 teams. After this amazing race, Henry Crowther swam 100 Freestyle, going an all-time PR of 47.34. This time was another school record and placed 16th. Paul swam 100 Butterfly and went a time of a 55.72, placing 30th. The 200 Freestyle relay was the next race that the Oratory swimmers competed in. They went a 1:28.86, another school record, including a 50 freestyle PR for Henry Crowther who lead off, and a 15th place finish. The last event of the meet was the 400 Freestyle Relay. The team placed 12th place, their highest finish off the meet for the team. They went a 3:14.95, dropping 3.78 seconds and breaking the school record.
Overall, this meet was a major success. The previous school record was broken in 4 out of the 5 events raced and many personal records were swam. This was an amazing way to finish the season.
