Swimming breezes by Franklin & Marshall

Both the men’s and women’s swim teams won their meets against Franklin & Marshall on Saturday. The Jays and the Lady Jays are both off to strong seasons with a 3-0 start.

The Jays came out strong, winning the first ten events to ultimately come out on top 146 to 89.

Hopkins had first and second place finishes for the first event, the 400 medley relay. Sophomores Patrick Flynn and Evan Holder, freshman Kyle Otazu and senior Ryan Cunningham all contributed to the first place win timed at 3:33.33.

“It is important for us to swim like a championship team even when we are not at a championship meet. The summation of many small successes will result in incredible results at the end of the season,” Flynn said when asked about the team’s progress thus far.

In the 200 free, freshman Luke Johnson won the event, touching at 1:47.07 to defeat F&M’s Dennis Chen. Placing third at 1:49:04 was Hopkins senior Aaron Katrikh. In both the 50 back and 50 breast, the Jays won the top three spots.

Sophomore Scott Sterrett won the 50 back in 25.20, barely beating his fellow teammate, freshman Jan Hagemeister, who then finished in 25.58. In third, freshman Ronan Corgel finished with a time of 26.99.

For the 50 breast, sophomore Bryan Pon came in first at 27.63, freshman Michael Ashmead came in second at 28.38 and freshman Bobby Lesko came in third at 28.54.

In the 200 fly, finishing first and second, senior Greg Kogut and freshman Mark Wilson had extremely close times: 1:56.02 and 1:56.61, respectively. In the 50 free, sophomore Jeremy Bauchwitz and Otazu also finished with extremely close times, with Bauchowitz coming in first at 21.92, followed by Otazu in second at 22.11.

“I think we’ve been swimming well this season. Our positive attitude is really driving our success as we’re coming towards the end of a hard training cycle,” Kogut said.

The Jays also did well in the 200 back, with Gibson finishing first, Cunningham taking second, and Corgel third. Freshman Colburn Yu had a particularly impressive performance, winning the 200 breast by almost 10 seconds with a time of 2:12:28.

Following the Jays’ strong performance, the Lady Jays also did well at their meet, winning nine out of the 10 events to defeat the Diplomats 137-95. Coming out strong with first and second finishes in the 400 medley relay, freshman Michelle Kim, senior Sammi Fox, sophomore Shirley Chan and junior Sean McGrath contributed to a first place win in 4:02.74. The second place relay team was made up of senior Ana Bogdanovski, freshmen Lena DiPrizito and Courtney Cowan, and Sarah Fauska at 4:08.09. For the free line, sophomore Helena Arose finished at 11:02.58. Finishing in second was sophomore Lindsay Kriz with a time of 11:03.94.

Bogdanovski noted that a big focus for the Lady Jays was simply to enjoy themselves.

“One of our main goals was having fun. Swimming is largely mental. We’ve been training hard for weeks, and we even did a full practice and lift before our races on Saturday,” Bogdanovski said.

In the 200 fly, sophomore Abby Brown came in first and freshman Natalia Rincon came in second. Senior Kylie Holden, continuing the winning streak, came in first at the 50 free at 25.28.

The Lady Jays had an equally impressive performance in the 200 back, with McGrath at 2:11.22, freshman Gwynnie LaMastra at 2:12.77 and freshman Sara Wujciak at 2:13.32.

Sophomore Shirley Chan mentions the team’s spirit as an important factor in their success on Saturday.

“Everyone was cheering for each other along the side of the pool, which shows our great team spirit,” Chan said.

The Lady Jays only lost one event, the 200 breast. Diprizito had a close loss to F&M’s Melissa Mullin by .12 of a second. However, in the 500 free, Cowan swam impressively, coming in first, while junior Ellen Marcus came in third.

The men’s and women’s teams are both back in action on Dec. 4-6 at the Total Performance Invitational at Kenyon College.