Welcome to the 2007 - 2008 Central Bobcat's and Lady Cats' Swimming

Regionals

SA Times - Central High School junior Matt McLaughlin is going back to the UIL State Swimming and Diving Championships.

McLaughlin earned his third straight trip to Austin by winning the 200-yard freestyle at the Region I-5A Swimming and Diving Championships in Lubbock on Saturday.

McLaughlin won the event with a lifetime best time of 1 minute, 45.22 seconds. He almost qualified in a second event, but he finished second to 2007 state runner-up Madison Gibson of Odessa High in the 100 butterfly. McLaughlin's lifetime-best finish of 53.58 is just 0.48 of a second off the 40-year-old school record of 53.1 held by Steve Boster.

The Bobcats also finished second in the 200 freestyle relay with a season-best time of 1:31.50 and fourth in the 400 freestyle relay with a season-best time of 3:23.76.

Only the winner of each event qualified for the state meet.

For the Lady Cats, Alex Porter was eighth in the 200 freestyle in a time of 2:04.77.

The Central girls were also fifth in the 200 freestyle relay in 1:45.96, sixth in the 400 freestyle relay in 3:58.01 and eighth in the 200 medley relay in 2:01.64.

"We had a lot of big swims," Central coach David Hague said. "We set a lot of personal bests on Friday and improved those times (Saturday). It was a really big meet for us. Matt came up big."