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Mustang Swimmers Shine At Section Finals
0515  Swim cutout
A sixth-place section medal was awarded to Soren Dickens after a great finish in the 100 breast. Photo illustration by IKE DODSON/THE LEADER

Soren Dickens and Joe Guerrero glided to medals in their respective varsity and frosh-soph divisions of the 100 yard breaststroke to lead the Oakdale High swim team to a terrific season finale at the Sac-Joaquin Section Finals on Saturday.

The program also enjoyed a thrilling 10th place varsity finish and new school record (1 minute, 19.67 seconds) from the 200 free relay team, made up of Dickens, Adam Lahey, Will Cavanaugh and Ryan Jones.

“I thought things went really well,” Oakdale coach Russ Van Cleave said. “A lot of the kids swam their best times and it was really exciting when that relay team finished 10th.”

Dickens qualified fourth for the 100 breast varsity finals with a spectacular career-best and new school record of 58.13 during the event trials. He came back to swim a 58.74 in the finals and easily beat a seventh-place mark of 1:00.56.

Guerrero made the frosh-soph finals with a 1:03.71 (qualified sixth) in the same event, then exploded to his personal best to finish fourth at 1:02.43. The mark lands him as the fourth-fastest 100 breast swimmer in school history.

Shelby Stender was 11th in the 50 free and 14th in the 100 free while fellow frosh-soph swimmer Summer Thompson ended 13th in the 100 breast and 15th in the 200 individual medley. Rhett Harrison worked for Oakdale’s top frosh-soph 500 time as well (5:15.30 in 18th).

“It was a good meet for us,” Van Cleave said. “It’s hard to do better at the end of the year, but it was fun to see how fast we were.

“The roar of the crowd and the energy level on the pool deck makes for pretty fun competition.”