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It was a nice accomplishment, but Mehta and his teammate aimed to improve. Scarsdale scored a Top 10 finish in 2011 and placed fifth last year.
Scarsdale continued its progress Wednesday as the Raiders finished second to two-time champion Horace Greeley in the Section 1 Boys Swimming Championships at Felix Festa Middle School. Greeley won the last event to overtake Scarsdale, finishing with 218 points to the Raiders’ 214.
“Last year, we finished fifth and this year we wanted, more than anything, to do better,” said Mehta, who will attend Carnegie-Mellon University in September and continue swimming. “We lost a great senior class, but everyone stepped up and did a great job.
The champions in each event and swimmers who achieved qualifying times advance to the New York State Public High School Swimming and Diving Championships on March 1 to 2 at Webster High School in Rochester.
Mehta qualified for states with a second-place finish in the 100-yard backstroke (53.28 seconds) and fourth-place showing in the 100 butterfly (52.81 seconds). He also swam on two relays – the 400 freestyle and 200 freestyle – which also qualified for states.
“Almost everybody did their personal-best times. To go from 13th in the section when I was a freshman to finishing second in the section is amazing.”
Joining Mehta in Rochester on the 400-free relay team will be Daniel Needham, Mitch Barrow and Charles McFarland. The 200-free relay foursome is Tom Cooke, Mehta, McFarland and Needham.
Mehta is looking forward to the state championships, especially after Scarsdale’s sectional performance.
‘I feel very good about going to states, and I am very optimistic about what we can do at states."
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