Brookfield Swimmers Win State Title

The Brookfield Bobcats Swim Team swam past the dominant swim team of the decade, New Canaan, to win it's first swimming state title since 2004 when they won the Class S championship.  Brookfield has moved into the Class M bracket and had too knock off a tough New Canaan Rams squad, which had won five of the last six trophies.

Getting strong performances in the backstroke from Jeff Magin, Conor Collins and Jordan Grossman gave the Bobcats a lead they wouldn't relinquish.  Janco Cornelius pushed them farther ahead of the Rams by finishing sixth in the breaststroke.  A decisive win in the final race of the day, the 400-yard freestyle relay, capped off the event and gave Brookfield the championship. 

The final points tally was Brookfield 464.5 points, followed by New Canaan with 429.5 points and Darien with 428.

The Bobcats knocked of the mighty Rams after finishing 300 points behind them last season.

"We worked so hard," Brookfield coach Brian Reiff said.  "We did mornings, we did things we never did before.  It's a dream come true."

Brookfield used a balanced attack to earn the title.  The win in the 400 freestyle relay by the team of Jack Dunn, Kyle Matson, Michael Becker and Conor Collins was their only first place finish of the entire meet.

New Canaan held a lead at the mid-point of the meet, with Darien in second and Brookfield trailing by 44 points in third.  Darien moved ahead and was in first place with only three events left with Brookfield and New Canaan tied 21.5 points behind.