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Devils Building With Youth

Mark Pinson/Highlands Today

Avon Park's Drew Sedlock competes in the medley relay event during a recent meet at Lake Placid. The Red Devilsare low on numbers this year, but are working hard to lower their times.

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By MARK PINSON Highlands Today

The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 15, 2008

AVON PARK - The numbers are down compared to past years, but the Avon Park swimming and diving teams have plenty of talent.

"We don't have as many swimmers and divers as we would like, but the kids on the team are very talented," said Red Devil assistant coach Shane Wirries. "We have some veteran leaders and we have some freshmen who have a lot of potential.

"If we can have another freshman class like this over the next couple of years, we'll have the numbers to match the other schools we compete against."

The Avon Park girl's squad is led by senior Brittany Murphy, who swims the 50, 200 and 500 freestyle and in a number of other events for the Red Devils.

Murphy won the 100-yard backstroke event with a time of 1:20.71 in last week's meet against Lake Placid.

"Brittany is our leader and our anchor," said Wirries. "She has been on the varsity for four years and is one of our most consistent swimmers.

"Brittany helps the other swimmers and gives them advice because she knows what it takes to succeed."

With the lack of swimmers, Avon Park has to be concerned with which events their athletes will compete in.

"We won't win many meets this season because we don't have enough swimmers to compete in all the events which costs us lots of points," said Wirries. "We don't want to overload the kids, so we're very careful with how many events they swim in."

Freshmen Jenna Tomblin, Selena Olguin and Autumn Roberts are working hard to improve and are concentrating on the freestyle events.

Sophomore Railey Miller has shown a lot of potential in the 200 individual medley and the freestyle events.

"Railey has a great work ethic and is only going to get better," said Avon Park assistant coach Quinlan Wolfe. "She is one of the first people in the pool and one of the last to leave."

On the boy's side, junior Drew Sedlock returns for his third year and he finished first in last week's meet at Lake Placid with a time of 2:37.10 in the 200-yard freestyle event.

Freshmen Mitchell Guernt, Kyle Jahna and sophomore Nolan Jahna have shown a lot of potential and just need to gain some experience under meet conditions.

"Mitchell is a big kid and he is only twelve seconds off the school record in the breaststroke and he's only been in the pool for two weeks, Wirries said. "Kyle has been doing sprints and Nolan has been working hard on the butterfly event and it's starting to pay off."

Freshman Jamie Wirries, who won last week's diving competition at Lake Placid, has a great deal of composure on the board.

"Jamie responded very well to the pressure of her first varsity meet," said Shane Wirries. "She has the talent and work ethic to be a force in diving for a number of years."

Pablo Pantoja and John Chittum finished first and second at the diving competition in Lake Placid.

"Pablo is fairly new to diving and really did well for his first meet," Wirries said. "John has more experience and they push each other to get better every day in practice."

With only 16 members on the team, Avon Park is focused on building a strong foundation for the future.

"We don't have a large team, but the kids we do have are hard workers and dedicated to improving," said Red Devil assistant coach Michael Scofield. "We're excited to see how much we improve over the course of the season."

Mark Pinson can be reached at 863-386-5837 or mpinson@highlandstoday.com

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