MANDAN, N.D. -- West Fargo swimming coach Marsha Dahl doesn't seem to mind the fact that her Packers keep coming up as the bridesmaids at the North Dakota state swimming meet. Instead, she insists on looking at the bigger picture.
For the fourth year in a row, Dahl watched as her West Fargo team finished second at the state meet. Minot won its sixth straight state championship in convincing fashion Saturday at the Mandan Community Center.
Minot, which advanced all its swimmers into Saturday's action, racked up 536 points to win the meet.
That point total was only 2½ points off the state record Minot established last season in winning the state title for the 18th time.
State title No. 19 was by a whopping 269 points over the Packers, who tallied 267. Mandan finished third with 247 points, while Fargo North (228) and Williston (204) rounded out the top five.
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Fargo South, which crowned one state champion, finished seventh with 177 points.
"This was the best state meet a West Fargo team has ever had," Dahl said. "For us, it's all a numbers game. We don't have the depth a lot of teams have, so we didn't expect to come in and do what we did."
And Dahl was not done praising her Packers.
"We have gone from infancy to adulthood in 14 weeks," she added. "We were taking baby steps when this season got started and, again, this is the best state meet in West Fargo history."
Andy Schoonhoven of West Fargo who was named the state's senior athlete of the year, was the winner in the 100 backstroke. His time of 53.33 was just .18 seconds off the state record held by Grand Forks' Matt Bonzer set last season.
"I was totally shocked," Schoonhoven said after winning the athlete of the year award. "I never expected it. There are so many great swimmers in the state and to win this is really special."
"This is nice," said Dahl. "Andy's been doing everything we've asked of him. And this shows that the entire state recognizes what a special athlete he is."
Schoonhoven also finished with a runner-up finish in the 50 freestyle, where his time of 22.69 was .55 seconds behind Minot's Max Greuel, who won four titles on the day.
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Schoonhoven also swam on a pair of relay teams that finished second.
Minot made its run to the state crown look easy. The Magicians won eight of 12 events, including a sweep of the three relay events.
Fargo South sophomore Andy Wolf also earned a state title. He won the 500 freestyle with a time of 4:55.91, which was about 10 seconds better than Minot's Patrick Greer.
Wolf was denied a double on the day when Grand Forks' Josh Demmers overtook Wolf on the final lap on his way to winning the 200 freestyle. Demmers finished in 1:49.89, while Wolf finished in 1:49.13.
"(Demmers) has such a great last 50 (yards)," Wolf said. "We've been battling back and forth our entire careers and (Saturday) was his turn."
Fargo North scored 46 points in the 100 breaststroke, the next to last event of the meet, to solidify its hold on fourth place. Matt Ziegelmann (1:05.23) and Christian Nasset (1:06.50) finished second and third, respectively, while John Vanlishout finished sixth in 1:07.04.
"We thought we might have an outside chance of getting second (place)," said North assistant coach Skip Fisher. "We had a solid Friday and we swam with a lot of emotion (Saturday). All in all, it was a pretty good weekend. We had a number of kids move up and we're pleased."
Josh Kelly joined Greuel as a double winner in the meet. Kelly, another junior, won the 200 individual medley 2:06.34) and the 100 breaststroke (1:03.89). Patrick Greer was the other individual champion for the Magicians. He won the 100 butterfly in 55.27.
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Defending state diving champion Alex Jilka, of Minot, finished second this season. He led going into the final dive, but Jamestown's Daniel Haas turned in his best dive of the meet to deny Jilka of a repeat.
For complete results from the meet, see the North Dakota scoreboard on Page C7.
