Warsaw’s Allison Thompson competes in the butterfly at the Warsaw Girls Swimming Sectional preliminaries Thursday evening. (Photos by Mike Deak)

WARSAW – Warsaw will be among the contenders in the finals of the Warsaw Girls Swimming Sectional Saturday afternoon, but so will three other teams after a balanced preliminary round Thursday night.

While times are generally relative to just needing to qualify for the finals, Warsaw has just nine swimmers in the championship round along with its three relays teams. And of those nine, only Brenna Morgan is a top seed in events. Culver Academy leads the way heading into Saturday with 17 finals places locked up, with Logansport and Rochester each with 11 finals swims.

Blake McBrier of Tippecanoe Valley extends towards the wall in the 200 freestyle.

“We’ll look at the finals Friday, see where everyone lines up and get a feel for what we need to do to get the job done,” said Warsaw head coach Tony DeBrota. “We kind of knew Culver was going to be the frontrunner having already seen them here, but you toss in Rochester and now Logansport, who has a bunch of kids in the finals, and it’s really anybody’s guess.”

Morgan is likely a lock to cinch up titles in the 50 free and 100 free after electric qualifiers Thursday evening. Morgan swam a 24.15 in the 50, which broke her own sectional record from a year ago and is just .07 off her school record set at the Northern Lakes Conference Championships in January. Rochester’s Madelyn Sailors qualified second at 25.38.

Morgan’s 100 time of 53.26 was miles ahead of the nearest competitor, again Sailors, at 58.16. Morgan posted a 51.88 at the NLC, her season best, and something similar Saturday is likely to come, according to DeBrota.

“I’m not too concerned with Brenna right now,” DeBrota stated. “I think if she swims what she did tonight on Saturday then she should be fine. I would love to see her get back down to that 51, and I think she has that 23 in her in the 50. When the finals come, she knows how to turn it on. She’s done it now for two years. She has a plan and she knows what to do.”

Warsaw’s Lauren Kuhl readies herself before the backstroke.

Erin Sandberg is also qualified to swim two championship races Saturday after finishing fourth in the fly and third in the 500 freestyle. Sandberg led a trio of Tigers into the 500 finals, with Jess Haines fourth and Savannah Taylor fifth. Taylor also qualified for the individual medley finals and Lauren Kuhl slipped into two finals as eight-seeds in the 200 freestyle and backstroke. Lauren Moeller will swim for a title in the breaststroke after placing fourth in the prelims.

Warsaw also placed eight swimmers into consolation swims for Saturday and will have one diver, Stephany Bailey, active for the diving competition.

Tippecanoe Valley is alive for three finals swims Saturday. Its 200 free relay will swim in the championship round along with Katie Gunter in the butterfly and Lea Stouder in the 50 freestyle.

Gunter landed sixth in the fly at 1:08.79, four seconds off Huntington North sophomore Emma Helmich’s pace of 1:04.30. Stouder posted a 28.38 in the 50 to slide in by .05 seconds as the eighth swimmer. Valley’s 200 free relay was seventh.

Sara Jones of Tippecanoe Valley works in the backstroke.

Gunter and Stouder both made consolation swims in the individual medley and breaststroke, respectively, part of eight consoles Valley will work. Viking divers Mia McHaffrey and Caitlyn Bailey will also go to work Saturday.

“This was a bad week as far as practice is concerned. We had just one,” said Tippecanoe Valley head coach Buddy Busby eluding to the weather problems. “I don’t know what to tell you as to what our times should look like. We didn’t get to practice.

“We figured we would have a few swimmers make the consolations and finals, and we got that. For the most part, we swam OK.”

The Warsaw Girls Swimming Sectional finals Saturday begin with diving at 9 a.m. and swimming events at 1 p.m. All swim event champions along with state cut qualifiers earn automatic qualification for the IHSAA State Finals next Saturday. The top four divers will move to the Mishawaka Diving Regional Tuesday, Feb. 10.