The eight senior swimmers for the Bobcats tried out some atypical events as Marshalltown defeated Des Moines Lincoln, 94-72, at the MHS Pool on Thursday.

MHS head coach Mike Loupee said the seniors were allowed to have one event of their choice tonight — for example, Sam Greazel did his first varsity backstroke, while Lincoln Barker, Michael Lechnir and Charlie Gilbertson all jumped into the breaststroke, where they had a 1-3 finish with Barker leading the way in 1:13.44.

“It was funny that they did all right, even if they’re not breaststrokers and proved that to themselves and me,” Loupee said with a laugh. “They were all in the 400 free relay right after, too, and came to me saying ‘That’s really hard right after the breaststroke,’ and my response was, ‘Sam Greazel does it every week.’ … but we had an opportunity to move the lineup around and have some fun, and have some really good racing.”

Marshalltown won all but three events on Thursday. Kade Randall had three golds with wins in the 200 and 500 freestyles as well as the anchor of the winning 200 free relay. Barker won the 100 freestyle with a new lifetime best time, won the 100 breaststroke and was the anchor of the winning 400 free relay. Sam Greazel was on all three winning relays on Thursday.

T-R PHOTO BY JAKE RYDER - Marshalltown senior Sam Greazel completes the breaststroke leg of the opening 200-yard medley relay during Thursday’s swimming meet against Des Moines Lincoln. The Bobcat relay team of Landon Stanley, Greazel, Charles Gilbertson and Michael Lechnir won the opening race.

“Lincoln doesn’t have the depth to match up with us, but they had some good quality swimmers to give us an opportunity to race,” Loupee said. “We’re swimming hard, not taking a lot of rest in practice and had really good splits all the way through on the relays.”

Loupee added that the medley relay all had season-best times; Aaron Hunter and Parker Christen had lifetime bests in the 200 freestyle.

Next up for the Bobcats is seeing how much is left in the tank for the third meet of the week, a six-team meet at Grinnell College on Saturday where Southeast Polk and Ottumwa will be among the teams to beat.

Swimming begins at 11 a.m. in Grinnell.

“Southeast Polk and Ottumwa are ranked ahead of us in the power rankings but in a championship-style meet, if we swim well, we can make it a close meet,” Loupee said. “While it would be nice to win the meet, our major concern is to continue to drop time and swim fast.”

With a shorter break on the calendar Loupee was only able to get 10 practices in for the Bobcats over the holiday break, but noted they were intense practices.

“They’re swimming with bodies pretty broken down but they’re swimming fast,” Loupee said. “We’re in the doldrums of winter where they’re getting to school when it’s dark and leaving when it’s dark. This is the test of their mental toughness but they can see the light at the end of the tunnel. … They’re whittling their times down when they’re swimming tired, so that has Coach [Ray] Dulaney and I excited.”

Marshalltown 94, Des Moines Lincoln 72

EVENT RESULTS

(Winners and MHS placewinners)

200 MEDLEY RELAY — 1. MHS (L. Stanley, S. Greazel, Gilbertson, Lechnir) 1:46.26; 3. MHS (J. Seberger, Daters, I. Seberger, Stupp) 2:01.12.

200 FREESTYLE — 1. Kade Randall, MHS, 2:02.92; 4. Parker Christen, MHS, 2:11.04; 5. Aaron Hunter, MHS, 2:11.62.

200 INDIVIDUAL MEDLEY — 1. Keegan Kraft, DML, 2:17.60; 2. Jacob Seberger, MHS, 2:19.73; 3. Joe Greazel, MHS, 2:30.46; 4. Landon Stanley, MHS, 2:43.69.

50 FREESTYLE — 1. Brayden Plourde, DML, 24.32; 2. Isaac Seberger, MHS, 24.60; 4. Hayden Daters, MHS, 26.32; 5. Zander Stupp, MHS, 28.17.

100 BUTTERFLY — 1. Charles Gilbertson, MHS, 54.85; 2. I. Seberger, MHS, 1:04.52; 4. J. Greazel, MHS, 1:13.19.

100 FREESTYLE — 1. Lincoln Barker, MHS, 51.77; 3. Michael Lechnir, MHS, 53.25; 4. Parker Christen, MHS, 59.10.

500 FREESTYLE — 1. Randall, MHS, 5:47.12; 4. Thomas Stanley, MHS, 5:53.36; 5. J. Seberger, MHS, 6:00.39.

200 FREESTYLE RELAY — 1. MHS (Christen, S. Greazel, Daters, Randall) 1:43.16; 2. MHS (Hunter, Barker, Stupp, J. Seberger) 1:43.74.

100 BACKSTROKE — 1. Kraft, DML, 1:01.08; 2. S. Greazel, MHS, 1:04.61; 3. L. Stanley, MHS, 1:07.08; 4. Hunter, MHS, 1:11.09.

100 BREASTSTROKE — 1. Barker, MHS, 1:13.44; 2. Lechnir, MHS, 1:14.37; 3. Gilbertson, MHS, 1:17.27.

400 FREESTYLE RELAY — 1. MHS (Daters, I. Seberger, S. Greazel, Barker) 3:40.15; 3. MHS (Stupp, L. Stanley, Lechnir, Gilbertson) 3:51.81.