Lee’s Summit North’s Ethan Bresette is The Star’s All-Metro Missouri boys swimmer of year

Ethan Bresette decided early into his swimming career that he didn’t want to specialize in any one event. He wanted to try them all.

“I’ve always tried to be a well-rounded swimmer,” said Bresette, a senior at Lee’s Summit North. “I’ve always wanted to have that flexibility to swim any event.”

That flexibility, as it turns out, made Bresette especially well-equipped for the one race that incorporates all the swimming strokes — the 200-yard individual medley.

The event developed into Bresette’s forte over his high school career, and he won the Missouri state championship in the 200 individual medley this fall, his senior season.

It was only a portion of his special day at the state meet, which also included a second-place finish in the 500 freestyle.

Bresette capped the meet by anchoring Lee’s Summit North’s victory in the 400 freestyle relay.

He is The Star’s All-Metro Missouri boys swimmer of the year.

“The state meet was a phenomenal experience,” Bresette said. “I had a personal goal to break a state record, and I was little off that. But looking back, it was still a really good feeling (to win).”

The individual accolades weren’t much of a surprise. Bresette placed in the top-five in two events as a junior.

Lee’s Summit North’s team success, on the other hand, was not foreseen. The Broncos won the Suburban Gold Conference championship for the first time since 2000.

“Winning conference, I’ll remember that forever,” Bresette said. “We had more swimmers (try) out that any other year I’ve been here, which made this year a lot of fun. It was a very big team effort.”

This story was originally published January 9, 2014 at 7:32 PM with the headline "Lee’s Summit North’s Ethan Bresette is The Star’s All-Metro Missouri boys swimmer of year."