Bengals turn in the best team effort in 5A finals

One of the beauties of swimming is that the goal always remains the same — to go fast.

Brighton High's swim program embraced that throughout the 2007 Class 5A state championships, and the end result was a highly successful meet for the Bengals.

Brighton collectively turned in the best team effort of anyone at the 5A championships, winding up with a second-place finish on the girls side and a third-place finish on the boys side.

Thing was, how the Bengals swam was much more important to coach Todd Etherington than where they finished in the standings.

"The object was just to come in and do the best that we could," he said. "I think — from beginning to end — they raced very well. It was just all about what we could do and not worrying about what everybody else was doing.

"It was all about just swimming fast," Etherington added. "Just swim fast. The places, the points, it all takes care of itself. You worry about the points, more often than not, you don't swim fast."

Up and down the board, Brighton's swimmers — for the most part — all dropped lots of time. In total, Brighton finished a massive 36 points ahead of its projected point total on the boys side and 16 points ahead of its projected point total on the girls side.

"It was really awesome how much everybody was dropping. It was incredible," said sophomore distance swimmer Cody Reed.

Reed was an example of how Brighton earned extra points. Seeded fifth in the 200-yard free, he dropped over four seconds en route to a third-place finish and two extra points for the Bengals.

He matched his projected finish of second in the 500 free, dropping nearly eight seconds in that event. Reed traded blows with champion Nate Swallow of Skyline, eventually losing by a second.

"I gave it all I could," he said. "I felt really good about it. Nate Swallow did excellent in the race and pulled it out in the end."

Meanwhile, junior Ali Siggard notched Brighton's lone win and helped the girls team beat out Kearns for second place. Siggard won the 500-yard free and finished second to American Fork's Candice Smith in the 200 free.

In addition to Reed and Siggard, Brighton also notched a host of other medalists.