WESTBROOK –The Gorham girls swim team outscored their Windham opponents by a substantial margin – 126 to 42 – Friday night, Dec. 6, to leave the meet victorious. However, the schools’ boys teams reversed those results, Windham edging out Gorham 88-77.

Adding each school’s boys and girls scores together yields an overall Gorham triumph, 203-130. Gorham hosted the event; their home pool is Davan pool, at the Westbrook Community Center.

“I always preach that, ‘This is the first meet of the year, this is our starting point, so don’t worry about the competition necessarily, don’t worry about the clock necessarily,’” said Windham head coach Peter Small.

“I think it’s awesome; my kids did great,” said Gorham head coach Laura Branch. “We had some minor errors, because kids are new, but I was very pleased at how well they swam.”

Indicative of the boys-girls split, the Lady Rams won the opening event, their 200-yard medley relay – Hannah LeBlanc, Molly Dufour, Blanca Monsen and Alicia Robinson finished in a time of 2:23.44 – while the Gentlemen Eagles won theirs – Josh Labrecque, Joseph Paluso, Sam Shoberg and John Giberti combined for a 1:55.69 time.

But consistent with Gorham’s overall win, they took both the girls and boys 400-yard freestyle relays, the meet’s final two events. LeBlanc, Charlene Landry, Monsen and Molly Sposato finished in a time of 4:41.55, while Timmer Sposato, Gunder Sandeno, Riley Jenson and Tim Smith completed their 16 lengths of the pool in 3:44.74.

Small said the first meet of the year is for teams to assess themselves and the progress they’ve made training in the preseason. “What we want to do is focus on ‘Where are we now?’ Because our ultimate goal is, as individuals, to get to a certain point in February, at the end of the year. For us, this is ‘see where we’re at’ – but you’ve got to leave everything in the pool.”

Though this was only the first meet of the season, both schools qualified a number of swimmers for States. For instance, Gorham senior Ashley Clark beat the 2:25 cutoff for the 200-yard freestyle by more than six seconds. Similarly, juniors Lyle Webster (2:25.90) and Sam Shoberg (2:27.35), both of Windham, and junior Sandeno of Gorham (2:28.03), all qualified for the boys 200-yard individual medley.

“We’ve got a number of people who’ve qualified in the past,” said Small. “So we’ve got a couple people who, today, fairly easily qualified. What was surprising to me was the number of kids who are first-year swimmers – never been on a team before – that came within two seconds, three seconds of qualifying for states.

“At this point in the year, for them to be there already, when their strokes are still somewhat rude and crude – it’s a good sign,” he said.

Branch is optimistic about the rest of her team’s season as well: “I’m excited, I’m very excited,” she said.

Windham’s Josh Blake draws a breath in the boys 100-yard butterfly Friday night. Windham junior Sophie Mazziotti, at right, cuts through the pool during the girls 100-yard freestyle in her team’s meet with Gorham last Friday evening.