CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. -- Taylor Norwood completed a near perfect career at the SEMO Conference championships Tuesday.
The Poplar Bluff senior won both of her individual events and earned MVP honors for a fourth straight year after swimming the anchor leg on the winning 400-yard freestyle relay that qualified for state in its final chance.
Raegan McAtee also earned two individual wins and Paige Bradley set a meet record in winning the dive before swimming a leg on the 400 relay with sophomore Carly Wiseman.
"We put a lot of effort into that," Norwood said of the 400 relay. "Coach (Beth Lewis-Muse) has been so stressed about our relay order and I think everything played out great."
The Mules found the right combination to cut 16.42 seconds off their previous-best time, winning in 3 minutes, 50.41 seconds.
"We were pretty excited," said McAtee, who earlier qualified for state in the backstroke, her fourth individual event this season, and won the butterfly.
Cape Central touched the wall nearly 4 seconds after the Mules in the final event, but the Tigers had already clinched the team title for the second straight year, beating Poplar Bluff 551-422. Notre Dame (348) edged Jackson (331) for third place.
The Mules won half of the events but picked up 20 all-conference medals to Central's 27.
"We weren't disappointed leaving the meet today," Lewis-Muse said. "Not a sense of failure, or we didn't accomplish something, there were some very outstanding performances."
It started in the dive with Bradley scoring a meet-record 415.4 that also eclipsed her team record by 66.2 points. The sophomore had already became Poplar Bluff's first diver to qualify for state and she could be joined by Peyton Moore, who placed third at 366.95, if the junior's score ends up in the top 32 in the state.
Bradley won the conference title last year at 349.2 and was 20.15 points better than the mark set by Lauren Bader in 2006.
"She has such a beautiful, graceful dive that we kind of simplified her dive sheet," Lewis-Muse said of going with a lower degree of difficulty.
Norwood missed her own team record in the 500 freestyle by just under a second in winning with a time of 5:12.19, her fastest of the season. She won by nearly 14 seconds and also cruised in winning the 200-individual medley by nearly 11 seconds, missing her own conference record by 1.27 seconds.
In four years at the conference meet, Norwood earned MVP honors each time, winning all eight of her individual events and six relays. She set conference records in three individual events and two relays.
"I'm super happy how I've gotten to swim with these girls the past four years and how we were conference champions when I was on the team," Norwood said of the 2016 title, Poplar Bluff's first.
"It's just sad to see it all go away."
The Mules lost a relay featuring Norwood for the first time since her freshman year as Central won the 200-medley relay in near record time. The Tigers missed breaking Poplar Bluff's conference mark by half a second while the Mules finished 2.54 seconds later.
Norwood's only other loss in a conference race was the 400 relay in 2015 when Notre Dame edged the Mules by 0.07 of a second to set a conference record.
"She is a great teammate," McAtee said of Norwood. "She's always telling us before a race, 'come on guys we can do this,' just kind of pumps you up, get ready for our race."
The Mules had already qualified for state in two of the three relays but were struggling to find the magic formula in the 400.
Bradley led off with a 100 split that was nearly a second faster than her best individual time this season. Jackson, Notre Dame, the Mules and Tigers were all together at the first exchange. Wiseman had the second-fastest split of the second leg as Poplar Bluff trailed Jackson at the third exchange. McAtee motored past the Indians to her left and held off Central's Allison McDonald, who won the individual 100 freestyle.
"We're pretty evenly matched so I was a little bit more worried about (McDonald)," said McAtee who turned in a 55.39-second split.
Norwood's split in the final leg was 54.2 seconds as the Mules pulled away.
"The girls came together on that order and it worked out spectacular," Lewis-Muse said. "I wanted them to go out and fight on that relay."
McAtee cut 2 seconds off her previous-best time of the season in winning the butterfly in 59.58 seconds and was also 2.13 seconds faster in the backstroke to qualify for state, winning at 1:01.28.
Like Norwood, McAtee will enter her senior year having not lost an individual race at conference.
Norwood, McAtee, Audrey Cisne and Mackenzie Garrett were second in the medley relay by 2.54 seconds at 1:58.33. Garrett, Cisne, Bradley and senior Megan Adams placed second behind the Tigers in the 200-freestyle relay at 1:53.23.
Bradley placed fourth in the 50 at 26.28 while Wiseman was fourth in the 200 freestyle, cutting nearly 5 seconds, and also earned all-conference honors in placing fifth in the 500 with her fastest time of the season.
Calli Barker earned an all-conference medal in the 200 freestyle, placing sixth despite swimming in the slower heat. The junior finished in 2:23.59, cutting nearly 8 seconds off her time, and was 4 seconds faster in the butterfly for eighth an all-conference honors.
"Barker had a big day," Lewis-Muse said.
Adams cut 6 seconds in the butterfly to place sixth at 1:16.93 and earned honorable mention in the backstroke by finishing 10th with her fastest time.
Garrett, a sophomore, was seventh in the 50 at 28.31 and also lowered her time in the 100 freestyle for eighth at 1:03.82.
Rush was eighth in the 200 freestyle after cutting a second off her time while the sophomore missed all-conference honors by just 2.38 seconds in the 500 in placing ninth for honorable mention.
Cisne finished sixth in the backstroke and was 11th in the 50 freestyle at 28.81 while Simone Anders finished sixth in the breaststroke by cutting half a second for all-conference honors.
Haven Phelps had her fastest time in the IM for 11th while Austynn Dover cut 7 seconds in placing 17th in the event. Madison Moore had her fastest time in the backstroke for 16th.
Bethany Leighty was 11th in 500, Emryn Smith finished 13th in the 200 and 15th in the breaststroke, Morghyn McCain was 15th in the 100, behind Anders and followed by Electra Destree to earn the Mules six points.
The team will find out Sunday if any more swimmers or divers finished in the top 32 to earn an invitation to the MSHSAA Class 2 meet, which will be held Feb. 16-17 in St. Peters, Missouri.