Two swimmers from Northwestern Lehigh competed in the District 11 Swimming and Diving Championship this past weekend at Parkland High School. Dillon Scott and Annikka Stangil each competed in two events.

Scott won a bronze medal in the 500-yard freestyle, finishing just .63 seconds behind silver medalist Ryan Evert of North Schuylkill. The Tiger senior missed the medal podium in Friday’s 200-yard individual medley, but he didn’t come away empty-handed.

Scott garnered the John Vernon Memorial Scholarship, which is given to the best swimmers who compete without the benefit of having a high school team to train and compete with, often making it more difficult to even reach, let alone do well in districts.

“I was very nervous coming in because I knew I was seeded fourth, which is right on the edge of medals,” said Scott. “I had been watching the results from all of the other swimmers and I was afraid they were going to catch up to me, but I figured it was my last race of high school, so I would give it everything I got and it paid off.”

Scott hasn’t made a final college choice but is considering Northeastern University in Boston.

Stangil, a sophomore, competed in both the 200- and 500-yard freestyle events, finishing 14th in the 500 freestyle and 18th in the 200 freestyle.

Gold medalists in each event receive an automatic bid to states, while other finishers wait to find out whether their times were fast enough to receive a bid to compete at the state level. Unfortunately, neither Scott nor Stangil received bids for the event, which will be held next week at Bucknell University in Lewisburg.

Blue Mountain High School won both the boys and girls team competitions. Other Colonial League schools competing included Moravian Academy (second in girls competition, fifth in boys), Saucon Valley (fifth in girls, third in boys), Salisbury (sixth in girls, ninth in boys), all in the 2A classification. In Class 3A, Southern Lehigh placed third in the girls team standings and fifth among boys teams.