GILLETTE – Five athletes representing Sublette County made a statement against considerably larger programs fielding dozens of swimmers at the 3A State Swimming and Diving Championships in Gillette on Nov. 3-4.

The Sublette County combined girls’ swim team’s relatively young squad qualified four athletes this season – juniors Jolynn Jones, Alexis Thompson and Emma York and sophomore Shelby Scott. Senior Addysen Levitt traveled to State to fill out relay teams for Sublette County.

The state championships consisted of preliminary rounds on Friday. The top 12 individuals and relay teams advanced to the finals on Saturday.

Two Sublette County relay teams made the cut to the final rounds. Levitt, Jones, Thompson and York snagged 11th place in the 400-freestyle relay finals on Saturday at 4 minutes, 15.12 seconds, an improvement of 3.70 seconds from their preliminary time.

Thompson, Scott, Levitt and York came in 12th place in the 200-freestyle relay finals, posting a time of 1:57.22. The team shaved 1.18 seconds from their preliminary time.

“This was the first time qualifying for individual events at State for Emma, Jolynn, Shelby and Alexis,” said Co-Head Coach Kursty Day. “They each did very well dropping their times and ending the season with new personal records.”

The 2023 season was characterized by significant improvements in times for many Sublette County swimmers. Day gave a shoutout to York, Thompson, Jones, Levitt, Hadlee Francis, Alyce Hayward, Aurora Rees, Matazi Landers, Mariaha Morgan, Libby Olson, Kamia Runyan, Evalyn Smith and Chelsea Wright for improving times in their respective individual events by 10 seconds or more.

“Combining two schools can be hard and it takes help from the team leaders to make it fun for everyone,” said Coach Day. “Addysen Levitt, Maggie Walker, Alexis Thompson, Chelsea Wright, Emma York and Jolynn Jones did a great job making all the young athletes feel like they were a part of the team.”

State preliminary results

• 200-medley relay: Scott, Levitt, Jones and Thompson in 13th place at 2:13.82.

• 200-freestyle: York in 16th place at 21:15.97, Jones in 21st at 2:18.05 and Thompson in 28th at 2:21.80.

• 100-butterfly: Jones in 22nd place at 1:13.18.

• 100-freestyle: York in 17th place at 1:01.52.

• 100-backstroke: Scott in 22nd place at 1:14.53.