2022 America East Fan Guide: 5th Years Give UMBC Men, Women Extra Depth

America East Championships

• Thursday, February 10- Sunday February 13, 2022
• Worcester Polytechnic Institute,  Worcester, MA (Eastern Time Zone)
• Defending Champion: Men- Binghamton (1x), Women- New Hampshire (2x)
• Live Results
• Live Video
• Championship Central

The America East conference is one of the many mid-major Division I conferences that hosted their conference championship meet after the NCAA Championship meet last season because of COVID-19.

But the meet is back to its normal slot this year, in the opening weekend of college competition. Also expected to return are prelims-finals after the league went to straight timed-finals last season.

Anna Metzler, a senior from New Hampshire, is the star of the meet, having qualified for the NCAA Championships in each of the last two seasons. She ranks #1 in the conference in 6 championship events, and that doesn’t include the 200 free, which she won last year. Her specialty is the IMs, and specifically the 400 IM is where she has qualified for NCAAs. She’ll go largely unchallenged at this meet, but will still have a goal of locking up another NCAA Championship invite.

• Participating teams: Binghamton, Maine, New Hampshire (women only), UMBC, Vermont (women only), VMI, NJIT (men only)

Note: because Stony Brook is leaving the conference next season, by conference rules, they are not allowed to compete at this year’s AEC championship meet. They will compete at the ECAC Championship meet instead.

Note 2: the conference included the 1000 free in its schedule last season, but the event is not on the schedule for this season.

Women’s Showdowns

The New Hampshire women are the two-time defending conference champions, though they should receive a big run from the UMBC women, who are much deeper than they were a year ago. That’s in part thanks to the return of big-time 5th years Nataljia Marin and Vanessa Esposito, whereas New Hampshire doesn’t return any swimmers.

On the women’s side, these two schools will win the majority of events, and that’s where most of the big battles will come.

Vermont has a lot of strength through the middle-distance freestyle events, bolstered by freshmen Jackie House and Ella Church, where they could be eyeing some upsets too.

100 Fly

Last year’s runner-up Michaela Herwig transferred from New Hampshire to Purdue in the off-season, but the Wildcats still bring back Abby McKinney, who was the America East champion as a rookie last season. She ranks 4th in the America East so far this season, and will get a huge challenge from the next New Hampshire freshman Chiara Pradissitto (56.37), as well as two swimmers from UMBC. One is Marin, back for a 5th year, who swam faster mid-season (56.15) than she did all of last year (56.16), and who has a best time of 54.9 from 2019. The other is Sierra Tosten, a junior at UMBC who sat out last season but has already been 55.0 this year. That’s easily a lifetime best for her.

100 Back

 Last season saw the top three finishers in the 100 backstroke well clear of the field: Caroline Sargent of UMBC, Metzler of New Hampshire, and Kira Parker of Vermont. With Metzler likely to swim the 400 IM this year (she didn’t last season), that leaves Sargent and Parker with a new challenger, UMBC sophomore Rola Hussein, for this year’s title. Sargent has the inside track – her midseason 55.82 is already almost as fast as her winning time from last year’s meet.

Men’s Showdowns

The top three teams in this conference have different areas of strength and depth on the men’s side. Binghamton has a very good breaststroke squad; NJIT has very good sprint butterfliers and backstrokers and could pull off an upset in the 200 medley relay; and UMBC has the top sprint freestyle group in the conference, and it isn’t even close.

But there are lots of races at this meet where one swimmer could be undercover amid enemy fire, with a single member of another team trying to disrupt sweeps by an opponent. That should make for some tense moments of racing.

Maine, meanwhile, is a few steps behind the rest of the conference. They graduated their best swimmer from last season, Andy Sprague, and haven’t been able to replace him.

Here are the races we’re most looking forward to.

50 Free

UMBC has 5 of the 6 fastest 50 freestyles in the AEC this season, led by the defending conference champion Niklas Weigelt. But whereas he was able to win last year in 20.65, the whole conference has elevated this season: already the top five in the conference, including four UMBC swimmers, have been faster than that winning time from last season.

While last year’s interloper Sprague has graduated, there is a new one: Binghamton junior Ryan Maierle, who swam a best time of 20.51 mid-season. His best coming into the year was a full second slower – 21.50.

Weigelt is going for a sweep this year as the top seed in the 50, 100, and 200 freestyles. UMBC is also seeded 1-2-3 in the 100 free and 1-2 in the 200 free.

100 Fly

The top two finishers in the 100 fly at last year’s American East Championships, Jake Vecchio and Ian Horstkamp-Vinekar, of Binghamton and NJIT respectively, were both freshmen. In fact, four of the top six from last year’s meet were all freshman.

That trend could continue this year, with UMBC freshman Oliver Gassmann entering the championships as the top seed.

Gassmann swam a 48.19 at ECACs mid-season, and was a 48.10 in high school, so he’s got the highest ceiling in this field, but is far from a sure bet.

100 Breaststroke

It’s like a big game of sharks and minnow, where the Binghamton breaststrokers are chasing the one swimmer with the potential to upset them, UMBC’s Daniel Nicusan. If this meet is close the breaststroke races could provide a huge momentum swim either way. Nicusan ranks first in the conference so far this season in both the 100 (54.28) and the 200 (1:59.26). In the 100, Binghamton’s Ryan Board is only .01 seconds back this season, part of a 2-3-4-5 seed for the Bearcats. He’s the defending champion in the event, but last year’s race was close.

Selections (WOMEN): Swimulator

Note: these are based on season-best times. The Swimulator still includes Stony Brook, and doesn’t include diving, so that will impact the results a little.

1. UMBC – 807.5
2. New Hampshire – 690
3. Vermont – 557.5
4. Binghamton – 386.5
5. Stony Brook – 332
6. Maine – 191.5

Selections (WOMEN): SwimSwam

The big piece missing from the Swimulator puzzle are both to the benefit of New Hampshire. UMBC didn’t score any divers at last year’s America East Championships, and while Binghamton has the best diving group in the conference, the Wildcats should still be able to make up some points on UMBC this season there too (even if UMBC enters divers this year).

New Hampshire benefitted last season from the inclusion of the 1000 free on the conference schedule, where they picked up big points, but that race isn’t on this year’s conference schedule.

While New Hampshire still has a lot of potential to make up ground on their current rankings, it looks like UMBC, thanks to the depth provided by swimmers like Tolsen returning from a redshirt, and 5th year seniors, has the depth to hold on to their current margin.

New Hampshire can expect a little more contribution from their freshman class, including sprinter Chiara Pradissitto, but they would need the back-end of their roster to step up in a big way to pull off the upset.

We expect this one to go pretty closely to chalk, though we expect the margin to be very close, less than 50, where one DQ or a swimmer having an off meet could swing the whole result.

1. UMBC
2. New Hampshire
3. Vermont
4. Binghamton
5. Maine

Selections (MEN): Swimulator

Note: these are based on season-best times. The Swimulator doesn’t include the 1000 free or diving, so that will impact the results a little.

1. UMBC – 952
2. Binghamton – 778
3. NJIT – 628
4. Maine – 315

Selections (MEN): SwimSwam

UMBC, in addition to the above, has a little better distance group. While, in a four team conference, the impact of any one event is fairly mitigated, UMBC should add an extra few points of margin in the 1000 free.

In diving, the opposite will happen. Last year, Binghamton went 1-2-3 in both diving events, while UMBC didn’t enter divers. Because of the small conference, it’s free points for UMBC to bring their two divers – only 10 divers competed last season.

That could be over 100 points of swing for Binghamton, which will tighten the meet up substantially.

But just like in the women’s side, the depth provided by the return of 5th year Kai Wisner for UMBC, who could win three events at this meet, should be enough to tip the scales in their favor. But again, just like the women’s meet, this is far from a lock, and if Binghamton gets hot in the right places, they could pull off the repeat title.

Utlimately we think that UMBC returns to its winning ways this year (they had won the title in three straight years until last year) and winds up back on top.

NJIT and Maine are pretty firmly slotted in 3rd and 4th, hanging on the opportunity to play spoiler in certain events.

1. UMBC
2. Binghamton
3. NJIT
4. Maine