By RYAN ARENA
L’Observateur

LAPLACE — Riverlands landed a big season opening win Monday in a battle of perennial top teams in the River Parishes Swim League, besting visiting LaVacherie by a score of 306-237. 

“Great start to the season,” said Riverlands coach Lindsey Vicknair. “LaVacherie is always a challenging meet, but good clean fun. We expect to grow. We are a young team, who graduated a good number of swimmers last year. I am incredibly proud of the progress the kids have made in the last month.”

Alli Badeaux, Jillian Badeaux, Jack Chapman, Anna Guidry and Alex Noel each swept their three individual events for the Stingrays (1-0). 

Grace Richoux and Jacob Palmature each captured two event victories. 

Rory Martin, Mia Oncale, Trey Romaguera, Cade Pregeant, Truman Treas, William Torres, Maddie Sympson and Jordan St. Pierre rounded out Riverlands winners. 

Vicknair said the swim league is getting stronger from top to bottom and though the Stingrays are now one up on a top rival, things don’t look to get any easier as the team attempts to secure another high finish.

“The league is growing, and teams that used to have half the swimmers we did are now holding rosters of 80-100,” she said. “That makes the meets more exciting and the kids get pumped up and focused. That’s the best part of this.”

Riverlands will host this year’s swim league invitational, which will be held July 11-13.

“We are excited about hosting the invitational this year,” Vicknair said. “We’ve been working very hard to make sure it’s a success.”