Jakub Mysliwiec, Tony Brcic carry Reavis to conference title

In the final two events of the day, Reavis turned a slim lead in the South Suburban Red meet into the Rams’ second straight conference championship.

The outcome of Saturday’s five and a half hour competition at Oak Lawn was still in doubt when Reavis’ Jakub Mysliwiec and Tony Brcic climbed on the blocks for the final heat of the 100-yard breaststroke.

Mysliwiec and Brcic went on to take 1-2 in the event and the 400-freestyle relay anchored by distance standout Matt Blicharski finished the meet with another first place to boost Reavis’ winning total.

“If we didn’t go 1-2, we wouldn’t have won conference,’’ Mysliwiec said of the 37 points the duo earned in the breaststroke.

Reavis won the team title with 379 points to 346.5 for runner-up Oak Lawn. Shepard (343) was third, followed by Evergreen Park (276), Argo (249.5), Richards (223) and Eisenhower (157).

“I was nervous because (Shepard’s) Sanders Yu had a faster seed time than me,’’ Mysliwiec said. “I really wanted to win it because that would help us win the entire conference.’’

Mysliwiec, a sophomore, clocked 1 minute, 5.34 seconds in the breaststroke and Brcic was second in 1:06.27. Brcic, a senior, said “this is an amazing way to finish.’’

Amazing is a good description for Blicharski, a sophomore who won his second conference titles in the 200 freestyle (1:51.15) and the 500 free (4:59.44). Blicharski went under five minutes in the 500 for the first time.

“It feels accomplished. That was my goal the whole season,’’ Blicharski said. “I told that to coach in the beginning of the season, I was going to go that.”

Other Reavis winners were diver Cody Karanosky (332.60) and Mysliwiec in the 200 IM (2:08.15). The winning 400 relay (3:30.27) was Marcin Ciszek, Michael DeAlba, Mysliwiec and Blicharski.

“The guys have kind of lived by the motto of whatever it takes,’’ Reavis coach Frank Keller said. “That’s been our personal motto this season. There was a lot of good competition at this meet.’’

Two Shepard sophomores won two events each: Zack Sierzega took the 50 free (23.30) and the 100 free (51.55) and Hayden Wiest won the 100 butterfly (59.29) and the 100 backstroke (58.30).

Shepard took first in the medley relay with Sierzega, Wiest, Jeremy Schultz and Sanders Yu (1:45.96).

“We dropped two seconds. That was pretty decent,’’ Sierzega said.

Oak Lawn won the 200 freestyle relay with Juan Barrera, Sean Nugent, David Le and Colt Vogt (1:38.58).