Lady Dogies Collect Wins and Personal Bests at Buffalo and Douglas Meets

NEWCASTLE, Wyo. - Gold defeated Black 56-41 in a mixed dual in Buffalo on Friday, Oct. 2, as Newcastle High School swimmers opened a two-meet weekend with an event victory and several personal bests. The Lady Dogies competed alongside Buffalo swimmers on mixed scoring teams before traveling to the Douglas Girls Invite Quad on Saturday, Oct. 3. The separate dual and invitational gave Newcastle back-to-back days of racing in different pool formats.

Allie Lunstra led Black with a victory in the 100-yard freestyle in 1:02.30 and a runner-up finish in the 200-yard freestyle in 2:21.33, both meeting 3A qualifying standards. Macy Steber, swimming for Gold, finished second in the 100 freestyle in 1:07.13, a season best for the sophomore and just one-hundredth of a second ahead of third place. Steber also placed fifth in the 100 backstroke in 1:21.66. Gold powered its team victory with five individual wins and a sweep of all three relays, closing with a 4:49.05 in the 400 freestyle relay ahead of Black’s 4:54.50.

Chevy Bryan joined Steber on Gold and placed third in the 50 freestyle in 32.13, dropping a second from a previous best. Bryan also cut six seconds in the 100 backstroke, clocking 1:35.15 in her finish. Black teammates Lillian Lopez and Natalie Dean added milestones of their own. Lopez finished fourth in the 50 freestyle in 32.86, improving by a second, and dropped nearly two seconds in her 100 freestyle swim of 1:18.81. Dean matched a personal best with a time of 35.32 in the 50 freestyle, then tackled the 500 freestyle for the first time. Dean finished fourth in 8:34.72 and achieved the goal set for that daunting race.

On Saturday at Douglas High School, Newcastle finished fourth with 17 points against three other 3A programs. Buffalo won with 143 points, followed by Douglas with 104 and Rawlins with 54. Racing in a meter pool required adjustments after Friday’s yard-pool meet, and the Lady Dogies worked through fatigue while continuing to improve. Steber, Shelby Smith, Lunstra and Lopez opened with fourth place in the 200-meter medley relay in 2:41.35. The relay brought four contributors together and produced another personal-best freestyle leg for Lopez.

Steber delivered Newcastle’s individual victory, winning the 100-meter freestyle in a personal-best 1:05.87 that met the 4A qualifying standard. Steber also led the Lady Dogies in the 50 freestyle, placing sixth in a season-best 33.72. That converts to 30.35 in yards, less than a second from the 3A state qualifying mark. Lunstra supplied two more strong finishes, taking third in the 100 butterfly in 1:22.68 to meet the 4A standard and fourth in the 100 backstroke in 1:20.75 to meet the 3A standard. Smith added sixth in the backstroke in 1:27.91, while Lopez placed eighth in 1:35.22.

Bryan and Dean continued their progress with personal bests in the 50-meter freestyle. Bryan finished ninth in 35.05 and moved within two seconds of qualifying in the event, while Dean clocked 39.23 in that event. Smith finished 11th in 36.08, and Lopez was 15th in 39.17. Bryan and Dean also took on the 100 breaststroke, finishing eighth in 1:59.06 and ninth in 2:04.60, respectively, extending Newcastle’s participation across the meet’s individual events.

The Lady Dogies’ second relay paired Steber, Dean, Bryan and Lopez in the 200-meter freestyle. Their fifth-place finish in 2:30.62 gave four swimmers another race together during a weekend marked by individual wins, qualifying performances and improvement throughout the lineup.