Freedom High School junior Hayden Taylor and the Parkland girls 200-yard medley relay team led the way for lehighvalleylive.com area competitors during Friday’s first day of action in the PIAA Class 3A swimming and diving championships at Bucknell University.
Taylor earned a silver medal in the girls 1-meter diving event with 467.45 points for her 11 dives. Senior Avery Hillier of Conestoga posted 480.35 points, which was 32 more than her District 1 score, to claim the gold. Taylor entered as the top seed with a District 11 winning total of 485.40. Juliet Hood of North Allegheny was the only other diver to accumulate more than 400 points, finishing in third with 450.95.
Parkland’s medley relay of freshman Baylee Kish, juniors Kelsey McPeek and Milla Hahn and sophomore Sydney LaBaugh was third in the A final in 1 minute, 43.49 seconds after qualifying fourth (1:45.92) in the morning preliminaries. Nazareth’s quartet of Kyla Spengler, Sydney Valvano, Vivian Werner and Lauren Summers was 23rd in 1:51.91. Wilson-West Lawn won the gold in a state-record time of 1:41.47.