By Bob Nuse, Sports Editor
The West Windsor-Plainsboro High South boys swim team didn’t win most of the races, but the Pirates won where it mattered most – on the scoreboard., The Pirates won just two individual events and two of the relays, but still came away with an 88-82 win over Moorestown in the Central Jersey Group B championship meet. The win put the Pirates in the state B Division semifinals, where they dropped a 102-68 decision to Scotch Plains-Fanwood on Tuesday. On the individual side against Moorestown, Kurt von Autenried won the 50 free (21.98) and Aleksandr Simonelli won the 100 free (49.06). The two were the only individual winners in the meet., But South’s depth came through as Simonelli took second in the 200 free, Josh Huang was second in the 200 IM, Manish Rachamallu was second in the 50 free, von Autenried was second and Michael zhong was third in the 100 butterfly, Charlie Lu was third in the 100 free, Michael Krigeris was second in the 500 free, Huang was second and Nalin Dwivedi was third in the 100 backstroke, and Rachamallu was second and Krigeris third in the 100 breaststroke. The Pirates also picked up a pair of fourth’s from Kyle Dixon-Anderson (200 free and 500 free), as well, “It was a close meet and we knew it would be,” WW-P South Jessica Turner said. “Moorestown gave us a run for our money. We were able to use our depth to get the win. Leading up to the meet we told them we needed everyone to give it their all in every lane. We had some of our younger swimmers and outside lanes drop a lot of time and they really pulled through. We told them we needed to avoid the sixth places and fight for every place.”, The depth made the difference as Moorestown won six individual events and a relay but couldn’t best the Pirates on the scoreboard., “Our guys in the middle and outside lanes, as well as the relays, all did what we needed them to do,” said Turner, whose team finished the season with a 15-1 record. “Last year in this (sectional final) meet we got out-touched a lot. We knew this would be a tough meet and this year we were able to get the touches at the end., “You want the meet to be close. It was a sigh of relief. Going into the last relay we had 84 points and we knew we just had to play it safe.”, The win gave the Pirates their first sectional title since 1989., “It was great for all of our seniors and everyone who was on the team last year who were not on the winning side,” Turner said. “They were looking for redemption.”
