Sophomore Will Modglin Swims 46.8 Back/1:45.7 IM at Indiana State Prelims

Indiana Boys’ High School State Championships

• February 26-27, 2021
• IU Natatorium, IUPUI, Indianapolis, Indiana
• Short Course Yards
• 2 sessions of prelims (split by region), combined for finals
• Prelim 1 results
• Prelim 2 results
• Finals heat sheets

The preliminary rounds of the Indiana Boys’ High School State Swimming & Diving Championships took place over two sessions on Friday in Indianapolis. The top 8 times of the two preliminary rounds combined, regardless of which preliminary round they came from, advance to the championship final on Saturday, while the 9th through 16th placed swims from Friday advance to the consolation final.

Among the biggest showdowns squared up is in the 200 free, where Franklin Community senior McKillip Ratzlaff and Carmel senior Griffin Hadley will square off in the center lanes for the 200 free title after prelims times of 1:36.43 and 1:36.64, respectively.

The race was a new entry this year for Hadley, after a 3rd place finish in the 100 free and a 5th place finish in the 100 back at last year’s state championship meet. They’ll be joined by two more swimmers, Jackson Carlile and Mitchell Schott, who swam 1:37s in prelims, and a full A-final that features 8 swimmers who were 1:40.0 in prelims. That cut is almost a second faster than the A final cut from last season.

Fast times flew in both preliminary sessions. While the meet is generally a very senior-heavy affair this season, there was one noteworthy exception to that trend.

Zionsville sophomore Will Modglin will look for his first career state titles as the top seed in both the 200 IM (1:45.74) and 100 back (46.83). Last season, as a freshman, he was the runner-up in the 100 back behind the State Record by Carmel’s Wyatt Davis, who has since graduated.

Modglin has been on fire since quarantines lifted. In December, he knocked six-tenths of a second off his best time in the 100 back, and his Friday prelims swim was another half-second better. In the 200 IM, he has improved his personal best from a pre-pandemic 1:51.37 down five-and-a-half seconds.

Other Top Qualifiers:

• Brady Samuels, a senior at Delta High, had the top seed in prelims of the 50 free in 19.59. For the Purdue commit, that’s a lifetime best by six-tenths and a whopping 1.2 seconds faster than he was at last year’s state meet. It also very-nearly matches Purdue’s best time this season as they head toward Big Tens: a 19.53 from Nikola Acin that is the top time in the conference this year. That time for Samuels already would put him in the top 6 sprinters in Purdue program history.
• Samuels is also the top seed in the 100 fly in 46.78, another huge drop for him from his previous PB – a 47.62 that he swam less than a week ago at his Sectional Championship.
• Another tight battle is brewing in the boys’ 100 free final, with Center Grove senior Ethan Martin qualifying first in the 100 free (44.61) and Boonville senior Braden Rollins qualifying 2nd in 44.62. Both swimmers came out of the same preliminary round. Rollins is the defending state champion ahead of Brady Samuels, who opted to shift his events this season. In fact, of last season’s top 7 finishers, only Rollins and Martin return from an A final that featured 7 juniors. Martin is a USC commit, while Rollins will head to Alabama next season.
• Mitchell Schott of Culver Academies leads the way in the 500 free after a prelims time of 4:26.57.
• While Carmel High are the presumed favorites to win the team title thanks to their depth, their only top seed in an individual event is junior Ryan Malicki, who swam 53.45 in the 100 breaststroke. Malicki is headed to Notre Dame in the fall of 2022, after one more year of high school. Carmel has the top seeds in the 200 medley (1:30.05) and 200 free (1:23.62) relays, but it is Modglin and the Zionsville 400 free relay that has the top seed in that event (3:02.06). Modglin split 44.32 on his team’s relay to end the session.