Bocci breaks record
David Bocci's final swim of his junior season was record-breaking, though he was hoping for a chance to improve on it.
Bocci, from Butler, broke the school record in the boys 500-yard freestyle with a time of four minutes, 36.36 seconds in Thursday's preliminary swim at the PIAA Class 3A championship meet at Bucknell University.
The effort was the ninth-best time turned in Thursday and set Bocci up to compete in the B finals in the evening session.
But he, and the rest of the best swimmers in the state, never got there.
Not long after watching his son's swim, Butler coach Dave Bocci ran into a PIAA official.
“He told me everything is shut down because of (coronavirus),” he said. “I knew different sports were being affected by it and I thought there was a chance of something like this happening.”
While the Class 2A swimming and diving championships (scheduled Friday and Saturday) have officially been postponed, to be made up at a later date, the rest of the Class 3A meet will not be rescheduled.
“Everybody was already here, what was another six hours going to do,” Coach Bocci said. “They also could have cleared the place of parents and fans, that was another option.”
While disappointed, Coach Bocci agrees with the decision to cancel the meet instead of bringing the swimmers back weeks from now.
“We've been resting our kids for almost two weeks,” he said. “We can't rest them that long and then ask them to come back and compete. Plus, you push everything back and it's gonna roll into the spring season.
“Class 2A, I'm not sure how they're going to handle it.”
David Bocci's latest effort topped the previous school standard of 4:36.37, set by Eric Namesnik, who would go on to compete in the 1992 and 1996 Summer Olympics.
“I'm really happy I got the record,” he said, “but not getting the chance to swim again, I'm bummed and I know there's a lot of other people who are, too.
“It seems all sports at all levels are being affected by this. It's crazy.”
Coach Bocci believes the PIAA could have been more proactive.
“Three years ago, there was a big snowstorm and it was announced going into the morning swim (preliminaries) that those times would be counted as final times because they had to shorten the meet,” he said. “Everyone knew what the situation was, the swimmers had to bring their best stuff, but that wasn't the case today. I'm glad Laura (Goettler, Butler senior) had a good swim in the breaststroke this morning. She swam the fastest time and is recognized as the state champion.
“But there's Owen Blazer (of Seneca Valley), he was definitely going to win a state title in the backstroke, but he didn't swim very fast in preliminaries and placed third. I just think the PIAA could've thought a little ahead and adjusted the schedule. Instead, they didn't know what to do today and panicked.”
Also breaking a school record Thursday was Seneca Valley's boys 400 freestyle relay squad of Kevin Donaldson, Daniel Simoes, Max Skeen and Blazer. They swam the event in 3:07.38, beating the previous record by .16 seconds and placing sixth.
