Kip Darmody made the most of his last high school swim meet.
The Providence High School senior, who will swim at Texas next year - one of the top college swimming programs in the nation - won two individual races and was part of two winning relay teams, leading the Panthers boys' swimming team to its second N.C. High School Athletic Association 4A title in a row.
Providence scored 267.5 points in the meet, beating second-place Green Hope by more than 70 points.
"It takes a whole team to do it, but Kip certainly had an amazing swim meet," said Panthers coach Sandy Martin. "He was so focused. ... He made it look easy."
Darmody won the 200-yard freestyle event with an All-American time of 1 minute, 38.21 seconds, and broke his own 4A state record from last year in the 100-yard backstroke with an All-American time of 48.84.
Darmody also led-off the winning 200 and 400 freestyle relays. His brother, Kyle, a sophomore, anchored both relays. The 200 relay team (which also included sophomore John Ferretti and junior Ryan Wilkinson) broke Providence's state record from last year with a time of 1:25.01.
The 400 relay team, which included juniors Kevin Glenn and Austin Snyder, finished in 3:08.92.
"I was almost proud like a mom," said Martin. "Seeing him culminate his senior year like that was icing on the cake. It just makes you feel so good when good things happen to people that deserve it."
Kyle Darmody battled the flu at the end of this season and had at 101-degree fever at the 4A Western Regional meet. His fever was down by the state meet, but he had lost five pounds and was still recovering, according to Martin.
Despite not being at full strength, Kyle managed to finish second in the 50-yard freestyle and the 100-yard freestyle, in addition to the two relays.
"He gave it everything he had," said Martin.
When Martin started coaching in 1997, both the boys and girls won the state title, but the girls have been dominant since.
This year, the girls lost the Southwestern 4A conference for the first time in 19 years, to Ardrey Kell.
Now it's the boys' team that is hoping to become the dominant program.
"We are certainly focused on (winning the state title) next year," said Martin. "I know we're losing Kip and Garrett (Webster), but our boys are strong."
Martin was talking about buying state-championship rings for the team last week; someone asked what they would do if the Panthers won the title next year.
"We'll order a bigger ring," she said.
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