Photo courtesy of Kim Hagemeyer.
St. Peter, Minn. – The Gustavus Adolphus men’s swimming and diving team registered 240 points on the second day of the MIAC Championships, moving ahead of Carleton into a third place standing with a two-day total 364 points. St. Olaf leads the way with 529 points after day two, while St. Thomas sits in second with 464 points.
“The men swam outstanding today,” said head coach Jon Carlson. “Carleton had a great first day and I wasn’t sure we’d be able to catch them, but we were able to dig deep and battle back and move into the top three with some great swims.”
Rookie Dante Colucci (Summit, N.J.) turned in Gustavus’ top swim of the day, posting a second place finish in the 100 backstroke to take home the first All-Conference honor of his career. Colucci improved his prelim time by nearly two seconds in the final, touching the wall in 50.88 to earn an NCAA B cut.
“Dante Colucci’s backstroke was simply amazing and was the highlight swim of the night for this team,” said Carlson. “To drop two seconds from his prelim time, earn a B cut, and finish second is exceptional.”
Jacob Stern (Fr., Rosemount, Minn.) provided the Gusties with two finishes inside the top eight. Stern placed fourth in the 100 breaststroke with a time of 57.84 and eighth in the 400 IM with a time of 4:19.62. Kurt Youngdahl (So., Wayzata, Minn.) helped out in the 400 IM as well, swimming a 4:18.47 to place seventh.
In the 200 freestyle, Zac Solis (So., Centennial, Colo.) and Jeff Nelson (Fr., Maple Grove, Minn.) contributed critical points after earning a spot in the evening final. Zolis placed fourth in 1:42.30 and Nelson took seventh in 1:44.22.
Sam Olson-Anstett (Jr., Shoreview, Minn.) and Ross Larson (So., Brookings, S.D.) rounded out the Gusties’ top individual swimmers of Friday night. Olson-Anstett finished seventh in the 100 butterfly (52.44), and Larson came in behind him in eighth (52.60).
Both the 200-medley and 800-free relay teams recorded a fourth place finish. Dante Colucci, Jacob Stern, Ross Larson, and Tommy Payne (Fr., Montevideo, MInn.) teamed up in the 200-medley relay, posting a time of 1:34.19. In the 800-free relay, Jeff Nelson, Payne, Zac Solis, and Kurt Youngdahl together swam a 7:06.69.
Following each race, all eight finalists were honored with a podium awards ceremony during Thursday night’s session, and the top three finishers in each event received MIAC All-Conference honors and medals for their achievement. Thursday’s updated team scores and All-Conference honorees in each event are listed below, and complete results from the session are available online here.
The MIAC Championships conclude Saturday with two sessions. The final-day preliminary round begins at 10:30 a.m. with the finals set to start Saturday evening at 6:30 p.m. However, the doors for the evening session will begin at 3 p.m., as the men’s 3-meter and women’s 1-meter diving prelims will begin at 3:45 and prelim heats of the 1,650-yard freestyle will also take place in the afternoon and will be completed by 5:30 p.m. All remaining sessions will be broadcast live online by Webcast America (click here) and all will also have live results available.
In addition, the MIAC has set up an exclusive Web site for the 2013 MIAC Swimming and Diving Championships. The site features an event schedule, ticket information, venue information and a map, as well as links to the live broadcast and live results, and the site will be constantly updated throughout the event with heat sheets, recaps, photos and more.
Dante, we are so proud of you and your hard work – and proud of your team also. Love, Nana & Dada