TACOMA — Relays were the focus for North Kitsap Saturday during the finals of the West Central District 4A swim meet at Foss High School and a pair of Viking foursomes saw solid improvement after qualifying through preliminary heats Feb. 3.

Junior Jeffrey Reeves was the lone individual to make a splash for North in the finals, swimming in the 100 meter backstroke and 100M freestyle, finishing sixth and 11th, respectively.

In the preliminaries, Reeves recorded a 58.04 second finish in the backstroke, just .04 seconds slower than the state-qualifying mark and the fifth-best time of the day. He earned a state-qualifying mark earlier in the year for that event and will represent the Vikings Feb. 17-18 at the state meet held at the King County Aquatic Center in Federal Way.

“Jeffrey swam in three events stacked right together,” said Vikings coach Greg Braun. “So he was off a little bit as a result. But we were looking for him to give our relays a big lift and (he) certainly did that.”

North Kitsap’s finest performance of the meet came in the 200M freestyle relay with Reeves, Josh Jones, Kyle Rencher and Brian Parrot swimming the event. The Vikings had the fifth-best time in the preliminaries with a 1:41.22 and shaved that down to 1:40.07 in the finals, good enough for a fourth-place finish behind Wilson, Gig Harbor and Stadium.

“The guys were fired up about that one,” Braun said. “Times were good and kids were going fast in that relay. The 200 free relay worked well for us. Getting to fourth bumped us up from fifth (Friday) and you have to be happy with that.”

The 200M medley relay team of Reeves, Rencher, Jones and Krister Seaberg also improved from the preliminaries to the final, trimming nearly a second off their time. NK came in 12th in the preliminaries with a 1:56.98 and was the last team to make the cut in that event. In the finals, the Vikings’ 1:56.02 was good enough to edge South Kitsap and take 11th.

“The medley relay went really well for us, too,” Braun said. “The relays did well (Friday) to get to where they are (Saturday).”

North Kitsap earned a total of 37 team points in the final events, tying the Vikings for 11th place in the district along with Port Angeles.

Wilson won the district title with a score of 261.