The Hazen swim team continues to make waves with a second-place finish at the 3A championships this past weekend at the Hazen pool.

Nine Hazen boys earned second swims during Saturday’s championship finals and the team finished with an impressive 201 points and scored 14 swims at this weekend’s state championships in Federal Way.

According to an email from coach Rick Wertman, Hazen’s performance in two events – the 500 yard freestyle and the 100 yard butterfly – perfectly characterized the team’s season.

In the butterfly, three of the six finalists wore Highlander blue with Hazen swimmers taking the second, third and sixth-place spots on the podium.

Junior Malcom Mitchell finished second after his best swim of the year while senior co-captain Kyle Nelson followed in third, dropping an “amazing” 3.5 seconds off his best time. Freshman Derek Wei finished sixth in his first district championships.

In the 500, the Highlanders finished first and second with “super sophomore” Connor Broughton taking the lead over fellow Highlander Mitchell at the 300 yard mark and finishing in a season’s best time to win the championship.

According to Wertman, two other individuals had stand-out meets for Hazen. Sophomore Turner Englehart had two great swims and earned himself two trips to the state meet.  In the 200 freestyle, Turner dropped more than 2.2 seconds and placed third overall. In the 100 backstroke, he raced to a state qualifying time, and his second trip to state.

Kyle Nelson’s outstanding swim in the 100-yard butterfly, moved him from 12th position to third and earned Nelson a trip to state. Nelson also posted a team-fastest split of 22.44 seconds in his anchor leg of the 200 freestyle relay.

Overall Hazen swimmers scored 14 swims at the 3A State championships next week and a chance to make a name for itself as a top ten team finisher.

The 3A state meet preliminaries begin Friday at the King County Aquatic Center.