The boys Swim team will take on Fort Zumwalt East and Pattonville in its tri-meet this Friday, Sept. 28. This will be their seventh meet of the season.

“We’ve had six meets, and we’ve done better than expected for a bunch of new swimmers, but it’s mostly been about fun more than competition so far,” sophomore Swimmer Sean Pirrone said.

After losing six seniors who graduated last year, this year’s 11 swimmers are working to increase the yardage they can swim and are placing an emphasis on starts and turns.

“It’s a young team with only two seniors, and all the others are sophomores and freshmen,”  Head Coach Steve Kelly said. “80 percent have no experience in competitive swimming, so it’s a big year of growth and learning.”

The team has been working on technique and filling events in order to beat the other schools in the meet this Friday. Even so, the team faces a difficulty when it comes to earning points. Points are earned based on finishing order in each event, and less swimmers and no divers makes for a natural disadvantage in some events.

“The biggest challenge is the lack of people, because other school’s teams are significantly bigger than ours, so they have more chances to get points for the races,” Manager Maggie Torbeck said.

The shortage of swimmers doesn’t hurt the team’s confidence, though. They’re ready to show off their talent Friday night.

“The team has a willingness to work hard and a good team unity,” Kelly said. “[FZE and Pattonville] are pretty equal to us, so hopefully, we can be competitive.”

The meet will take place at the St. Peters Rec-Plex this Friday, Sept. 28, at 3:30 p.m.