Cardinal swimmers go 1-1 at Lincoln

The Cardinals topped Lincoln by a score of 54-40, while the Warriors — one of the top teams in the state — defeated Newton 68-26.

The Cards won two of the 14 events, took second in four and third in two others. Waukee won eight events and Lincoln won one.

“I thought we did real well,” Newton coach Dave Hook said. “When the first power rankings come out, Waukee will probably be in the top five in the state. They’re a very good team and very deep. Us being with them in a lot of races was real exciting. And to beat Lincoln was good because we hadn’t done that in a while.”

Like his debut meet at the Newton Y Nov. 20, Thursday was another big night for Cardinals’ senior foreign exchange student-athlete Matheus Pinto. He won both of his individual swims — the 200-yard freestyle and 100 butterfly in times of 1 minute, 51.79 seconds and 56.29 seconds. He also helped two relay teams take second.

“He just keeps surprising me,” Hook said of Pinto, who hails from Brazil. “Every challenge I’ve given him he’s really met. He doesn’t complain. He just says, ‘Sure, I’ll try it.’”

Newton got second-place individual swims from freshman Austin Bunker in the 500 freestyle in 5:29.26 and from senior Luke Norcross in the 100 backstroke in 1:01.24.

“I thought Austin did a nice job,” Hook said. “He’s very consistent with his times in the 500 so far. We’ll depend on him there. Luke’s times are coming down in his backstroke. He was a couple 10ths away from first.”

Norcross also took third in the 200 individual medley in 2:16.82 — just .14 behind second, while senior Cody Maxwell placed third in the 100 breaststroke in 1:13.11.

Newton’s 200 medley relay team of seniors Norcross, Pinto, Ryan Jolivette and Josh Smith took second in 1:48.44, while the 200 freestyle relay squad of Norcross, Bunker, Smith and Pinto took second in 1:34.82 — which was .54 behind first.