A contingent of 26 Schuylkill League swimmers and divers descended upon Bucknell University’s Kinney Natatorium this morning ready to make their mark at the two-day Class AA portion of the PIAA Swimming Championships.

T102 Sports Now content editor Leroy Boyer will provide full coverage of the state meet, with live updates all day on X @pubsportsboss and stories posted on www.t102sportsnow.com after the morning preliminaries, afternoon diving and evening finals.

Here’s what you need to know heading into Wednesday’s opening day:

Schedule

Each day follows the same pattern — preliminaries in the morning, diving in the afternoon and consolation/finals in the late afternoon/evening.

The top 16 finishers in each event in the morning preliminaries return for the evening session, with the top eight swimming for medals and 9-16 competing in the consolations.

Here’s a time schedule for the two days:

WEDNESDAY

8:05-9:45 a.m. — Girls’ preliminaries in 200 medley relay, 200 freestyle, 200 IM, 50 freestyle, 100 butterfly, 200 freestyle relay

10:55 a.m.-12:35 p.m. — Boys’ preliminaries in 200 medley relay, 200 freestyle, 200 IM, 50 freestyle, 100 butterfly, 200 freestyle relay

12:40-3:55 p.m. — Girls’ diving championships

4:35-6:10 p.m. — Girls’ consolations and finals in 200 medley relay, 200 freestyle, 200 IM, 50 freestyle, 100 butterfly, 200 freestyle relay

6:55-8:35 p.m. — Boys’ consolations and finals in 200 medley relay, 200 freestyle, 200 IM, 50 freestyle, 100 butterfly, 200 freestyle relay

THURSDAY

8:05-9:45 a.m. — Girls’ preliminaries in 100 freestyle, 500 freestyle, 100 backstroke, 100 breaststroke, 400 freestyle relay

10:55 a.m.-12:35 p.m. — Boys’ preliminaries in 100 freestyle, 500 freestyle, 100 backstroke, 100 breaststroke, 400 freestyle relay

12:40-3:55 p.m. — Boys’ diving championships

4:35-6:20 p.m. — Girls’ consolations and finals in 100 freestyle, 500 freestyle, 100 backstroke, 100 breaststroke, 400 freestyle relay, followed by Class AA girls’ team awards

7-8:45 p.m. — Boys’ consolations and finals in 100 freestyle, 500 freestyle, 100 backstroke, 100 breaststroke, 400 freestyle relay, followed by Class AA boys’ team awards

Fan Information

If you’re planning on attending the PIAA Swimming Championships, tickets cost $8 per day (plus applicable fees) and must be purchased online at www.piaa.org.

If you’re going up to Bucknell on Wednesday, hopefully you bought a ticket ahead of time, because Wednesday’s swimming sessions are sold out. Tickets remain for the two diving competitions and Thursday’s swimming sessions. I’d buy them as soon as possible, as they’re likely to sell out as well.

*** If you want to watch the competition from home, PCN will televise both days, starting at 8:05 a.m. Check your local TV listings for which channel PCN is located on, or visit www.pcntv.com to watch the action via the Internet.

The Participants

A total of 14 girls and 12 boys from the Schuylkill League earned berths to the state championships, either by winning gold at the District 11 Swimming Championships or qualifying based on their district time.

Here’s a list of local competitors, broken down by day and event. Their seed in their event and their qualifying time are also listed:

WEDNESDAY GIRLS

Tamaqua’s 200 medley (Kate Behun, Savannah Wilson, Audrey Nattress, Ava Jones), 26^th, 1:56.15

Marian’s Lydia Strucko — 200 IM, 10^th, 2:10.51

Blue Mountain’s Sage Kaplafka — 50 freestyle, 11th, 24.32

Schuylkill Haven’s Hope Stauffer — 50 freestyle, 17^th, 24.79

Blue Mountain 200 free relay (Alayna Hensel, Julia Crossen, Isabella Lafko, Sage Kaplafka), 19th, 1:43.28

Sch. Haven 200 free relay (Teagan Wehr, Nikki Domermuth, Cali Stauffer, Hope Stauffer), 20^th, 1:43.30

Blue Mountain’s Hailey Scheuer — Diving, 15^th, 344.45

 

WEDNESDAY BOYS

Blue Mountain 200 medley relay (Brody Moyer, Noah Powers, Porter Sarnes, Aidan Varney), 12^th, 1:40.77

Marian’s Michael Strucko — 200 freestyle, 7^th, 1:45.29

Blue Mountain’s Porter Sarnes — 200 freestyle, 23^rd, 1:50.00

Schuylkill Haven’s Ethan Miller — 200 IM, 27^th, 2:02.32

Blue Mountain’s Noah Powers — 50 freestyle, 1^st, 20.34

Blue Mountain’s Brody Moyer — 100 butterfly, 24th, 54.93

Blue Mountain 200 free relay (Moyer, Gabe Kamarousky, Varney, Powers), 3rd, 1:28.83

THURSDAY GIRLS

Blue Mountain’s Sage Kaplafka — 100 freestyle, 14th, 54.05

Schuylkill Haven’s Hope Stauffer — 100 freestyle, 16^th, 54.38

Marian’s Lydia Strucko — 100 backstroke, 6^th, 57.21

Tamaqua’s Savannah Wilson — 100 breaststroke, 6^th, 1:06.22

Blue Mountain 400 free relay (Hensel, J. Crossen, Lafko, Kaplafka), 24th, 3:49.01

Sch. Haven 400 free relay (Wehr, Domermuth, C. Stauffer, H. Stauffer), 29^th, 3:50.61

THURSDAY BOYS

Blue Mountain’s Noah Powers — 100 freestyle, 2nd, 45.09

North Schuylkill’s Gavin Mentzer — 100 freestyle, 25th, 49.87

Blue Mountain’s Porter Sarnes — 500 freestyle, 16^th, 4:52.41

Marian’s Michael Strucko — 100 backstroke, 5th, 51.89

Blue Mountain’s Brody Moyer — 100 backstroke, 19^th, 55.14

Blue Mountain’s 400 free relay (Liam Magdeburg, Zach Scala, Sarnes, Kamarousky), 25^th, 3:26.27

Pottsville’s Adam Klinger — diving, 8^th, 396.85

Tamaqua’s Vincenzo Valentine — diving, 22^nd, 259.80

Top Storylines

*** The most-watched male swimmer over the next two days at Bucknell will be Blue Mountain senior Noah Powers, who will look to win gold medals in both the 50-yard freestyle and 100 freestyle.

The University of Virginia commit is seeded first in the 50 freestyle with a qualifying time of 20.34 seconds and second in the 100 freestyle behind Indiana’s Preston Kessler (44.91) with a District 11-winning time of 45.09.

Powers won the 50 free gold as a freshman and the 100 freestyle gold (43.82) last year, beating Kessler (44.01) in the finals. He most likely would have won the 50 free gold last season, but a malfunctioning starting block hampered him at the start and he finished second with a time of 20.58 seconds behind North Catholic’s Luke Lamb (20.44).

Powers, obviously infuriated, then moments later swam a state-record 19.82 as the leadoff leg on the Eagles’ 200 freestyle relay, which placed second.

How fast can Powers go? Can he break the 20-second mark in the actual 50 freestyle? Can he go under 19? I can’t wait to watch.

*** Powers will look to join Marian’s Danny Berlitz as Schuylkill League male swimmers with four state gold medals. Berlitz won the Class AA 500 freestyle in 2017 and 2019 and the 200 IM in 2018 and 2019.

Other Schuylkill League male gold medalists include Pottsville’s Chris Grabowski (1999, 3A 500 freestyle) and North Schuylkill’s Reggie Crawford (2018, AA 50 freestyle).

*** Marian siblings Michael and Lydia Strucko have excellent chances to capture their first PIAA medals. Michael is seeded seventh in the 200 freestyle and fifth in the 100 backstroke, while Lydia is 10^th in the 200 IM and sixth in the 100 backstroke.

*** Pottsville junior diver Adam Klinger will look to become the Tide’s first-ever diving state medalist when he competes in the boys’ diving championships Thursday afternoon. Klinger enters seeded eighth (the top 8 earn medals).

At states for the third time, Klinger was 14^th last year. The Schuylkill League and District 11 Class AA champion, Klinger has worked incredibly hard all season, going to various invitations and competing against some of the other divers in Thursday’s competition. A state medal would be a perfect cap to a great season.

*** Relay Rotations — Five girls’ relays and three Blue Mountain boys’ relays will compete at states.

On the girls’ side, the Tamaqua 200 medley relay and the 200 freestyle and 400 freestyle foursomes from Schuylkill Haven and Blue Mountain will all hit the water in the morning preliminaries.

None of the five are seeded in medal contention spots, so finishing in the top 16 and returning to the evening consolations would be a great accomplishment for any of the five quartets.

On the boys’ side, the Blue Mountain 200 freestyle relay of Brody Moyer, Gabe Kamarousky, Aidan Varney and Powers is seeded third (1:28.83) behind Indiana (1:25.92) and Tunkhannock (1:28.26).

The Schuylkill League has never had a relay team win a state gold. Could this be the first? I’m not sure.

Speaking of relays, which other relay does Powers swim in? Do the Eagles keep the same rotations for the 200 medley (seeded 12^th) and 400 free relay (25^th), or do they shuffle personnel and move Powers to the 400 freestyle relay?

Odds and Ends

The 26 state qualifiers are the most from the Schuylkill League since it had 28 in 2019.

The Schuylkill League has had 20 more state qualifiers eight times since I started tracking these numbers in 2004-05 — 2005 (28), 2006 (23), 2007 (21), 2017 (20), 2019 (28), 2022 (24), 2023 (23), 2025 (26).

*** The Schuylkill League earned 49 medals (36 individual, 13 relay) at the District 11 Swimming Championships, 14 of which were gold. There were 27 girls’ medalists and 22 boys’ medalists, with seven gold apiece.

That number is down from 56 in 2024. The league had an all-time high of 58 in 2022 and 54 in 2023, with 15 champions in both ’22 and ’23 and 14 champs last year.

*** It was one year ago this weekend that I left my former employer thinking I had covered my final PIAA Swimming Championships. I’m back again this year for the 21st time and going to love every minute of it.

People-Tag: Adam Klinger, Aidan Varney, Alayna Hensel, Audrey Nattress, Ava Jones, Brody Moyer, Cali Stauffer, Chris Grabowski, Danny Berlitz, Ethan Miller, Gabe Kamarousky, Gavin Mentzer, Hailey Scheuer, Hope Stauffer, Isabella Lafko, Julia Crossen, Kate Behun, Liam Magdeburg, Luke Lamb, Lydia Strucko, Michael Strucko, Nikki Domermuth, Noah Powers, Porter Sarnes, Preston Kessler, Reggie Crawford, Sage Kaplafka, Savannah Wilson, Teagan Wehr, Vinny Valentine, Zach Scala