Men's swimming places second at ECAC tourney

The ECAC men's swimming and diving championships came and went this past weekend at the University of Pittsburgh, with Hopkins taking second place. Head Hopkins swimming coach George Kennedy was named Coach of the Meet. The ECACs, which featured Division I, II and III teams, was the Blue Jays' final showcase before the NCAA Championships in a few weeks.

"The NCAA entries were sent Monday, so this was the last time to qualify" Coach Kennedy said. Thus, the Blue Jay swimmers knew the importance of this meet.

The three-day meet took place from Friday to Saturday. The Jays got off to a good start on the first day, finishing in third place with 123 points. Hopkins won the first event of the meet, the 200-yard freestyle relay, with sophomore Chris Whelan, senior Brad Test, sophomore John Thomas and freshman Brian Keeley finishing with a time of 1:23.72. Keeley would follow the strong performance up later in the 200-yard individual medley, finishing fourth. In the 50-yard freestyle, Test finished in first place in a scorching 20.85 seconds.

The Jays finished day one with a second-place finish behind Pittsburgh in the 400 medley relay, with Thomas, senior Matt Fedderly, sophomore Spiros Moisiades and Test finishing two seconds off the pace with a time of 3:22.29.

"Overall I was happy with where I was individually," Test said. "I was pretty disappointed in the 200 freestyle relay, because we were trying to qualify Chris Whelan, but we came up a little short."

The second day brought even more good fortune for the Blue Jay swimmers, as they moved up from third place to second place by the end of the day. Hopkins started off with a fifth-place finish in the 400-yard medley relay, with sophomore Neil Mahoney, Fedderly, sophomore Teddy Bulakul and Keeley finishing in 1:34.12. Following that performance, junior Colin Kleinguetl finished sixth in the 400-yard individual medley with a time of 4:06.96, his season best time. Moisiades then swam a career best 51.17 in the 100 butterfly to finish eighth. Test then continued his individual success from day one, finishing second in the 200-yard freestyle clocking in at 1:41.75 and narrowly missing out on first place. Hopkins then took fourth through sixth places in the 100-yard breaststroke, with junior John Kegelman, Fedderly and Keeley finishing with times of 57.44, 57.62 and 57.64 respectively. To finish the day, Hopkins received two very strong first place finishes to push the Jays into second place. Thomas finished first in the 100 backstroke with a time of 49:75, and the 800 freestyle relay team consisting of Mahoney, junior David Postetter, Test and Thomas finished in 6:48.81, three seconds ahead of second-place Harvard.

"It was good to see that I was pretty close to my best times," Thomas said. "So it was a really promising meet in preparing for nationals."

Hopkins came into day three 40 points shy of Harvard, and knew they would need a very fast day to make up the margin. Kleinguetl started off the day by placing fourth in the grueling 1,650-yard freestyle with a time of 16:07.87. He was followed by Thomas, who continued his dominance at the meet by winning his second individual event, the 200 backstroke, in 1:49.58, one hundredth of a second ahead of second-place finisher Josh Rosenbluth of Rider University. The Jays swam fantastic races in the 200 breaststroke with Fedderly, Kegelman and Keeley finishing first, third and fifth respectively. Kleinguetl then finished fifth in the 200 'fly with a time of 1:53.22. The Jays finished the meet on a positive note with a win in the 400 freestyle relay, swam by Mahoney, Bulakul, Thomas and Test in 3:03.95.

While performing very well as a team, Test, Thomas and Fedderly confirmed their status as three of the best Division-III swimmers in the nation.

"[They] are three of the best swimmers in DIII," Kennedy said. "Each of them has won the DIII National Swimmer of the Week Award and all three race well. They all have something that no coach can teach - the killer instinct ... and they all handle this differently. It is fun to work with them and I cannot wait to see them excel in two weeks at NCAAs."

Up next for the men's team are the NCAA Championships, which will take place from March 20 to 22 in Oxford, Ohio. Ten men's team swimmers, Test, Thomas, Fedderly, Kegelman, Mahoney, Postetter, Sershon, Moisiades, Kleinguetl and Keeley qualified for Nationals, with Test and Thomas qualifying in six events, and Fedderly qualifying in five.

Coach Kennedy knows that even though the season will end on such a high-pressure meet, the team's practices will focus on trying to alleviate some of that pressure. "The team will focus on fine tuning starts and turns, doing a touch of power work, speed work and rest," he said. "Each of them has an opportunity to have a lot of fun at the meet - so our practices will be upbeat."