The first night of the 2014 Atlantic-10 Championships started with only two events, but the excitement could not be matched with only two relay events being contested. The finals of one diving event also took place tonight. The Championships are taking place in Geneva, Ohio, who will also host the NCAA Division II National Championships in March.
The night started off with what could be called an upset based on the psych sheet in the Women’s 200 Medley Relay. The University of Richmond’s relay team of Maggie Pope, Mali Kobelja, Kelley Yang, and Laura Jordan dropped over 4 seconds from their seed time to take the victory over the top seeded University of Massachusetts, who was disqualified for an early take-off from it’s freestyle leg. The race would be tightly contested until Yang entered the water with a 23.73 butterfly split, almost .75 seconds faster than the next fastest split in the group. They would finish strong and end up with the victory at a 1:41.09. Fordham University would take second at 1:42.37 while the University of Rhode Island would round out the top three with a time of 1:42.65.
The men would then take the pool in the same event. It would be a tight race for first and second with only a little over half a second separating them. Meanwhile almost a full second separated second from third as well as third from fourth. St. Bonaventure University would battle with Saint Louis for the whole race, but similarly to the Women before them, the butterfly would make the difference. St. Bonaventure’s Ripley Danner would split a 21.22 on the butterfly leg to secure the victory for the Bonnies. Danner would be joined by Vatslav Lets, Matthew Schutt, and Jimmy Martin on the top of the podium with a 1:28.74, a new A-10 Conference and meet Record. Saint Louis would take second also breaking both records with a 1:29.35. University of Massachusetts would round out the top 3.
The focus would then switch to the diving well as the finals of the Men’s 1 meter diving competition would be taking place. A strong freshman showing from the University of Massachusetts would be the story on the boards as they took four of the top 8 positions. Joshua Koppel would take top honors scoring 303.75 points. George Mason’s Nick Guttendorf would take second with 267.60 points and La Salle’s CJ Gimpel would round out the top three with 248.80 points. Other scorer’s for UMass were Nolan Burns- 4th, Robert Barry- 5th, and Niles Ackerman- 8th.
We would then shift back to the pool for the remainder of the session as the Women took to the pool in the 800 Freestyle Relay. Richmond would again use huge time drops from their seed time to take top honors in this relay event as well. This would be one tight 800 Free relay race as the top 5 teams were only seperated by about 2 seconds. The team of Natalia Ares, Allison Titley, Molly McSweeney, and Meredith Gouger would be the Spider’s line-up that would be placed on the top of the podium with a 7:23.14. UMass would take second in a 7:23.27 and Duquesne would take the bronze with a time of 7:24.84.
Finishing off the night, the Men would take the shot at the 800 Free Relay as well. This would be a fast race in comparison to previous years in the conference as each of the top 3 teams would break both the meet and conference records. George Mason University would have the lead for the first two legs until St. Bonaventure’s Ripley Danner, who already made a large impact on the 200 Medley earlier in the night would drop a 1:38, 2 seconds faster than Brandon Nestor for George Mason. Then Senior Bonnie Jimmy Martin, who was also a key player on the earlier relay would drop a 1:35.91 split to secure the victory for the Bonnies. They were joined by Michael Pilyugin and Viacheslav Shchukin with a winning time of 6:29.80. George Mason would secure the silver in 6:32.80 with UMass nipping on their heels for the bronze in 6:33.67.
The Meet will continue with Friday Prelims staring at 10:30 AM EST.
Scores after Day One are
Women’s Team Score
1. Univ. of Richmond 80
2. George Mason 60
3. Fordham Univ. 58
3. Univ. of Rhode Island 58
5. Duquesne Univ. 56
6. George Washington 50
6. St. Bonaventure 50
8. La Salle 44
9. Univ. of Massachusetts 34
10. Saint Louis 32
Men’s Team Score
1. Univ. of Massachusetts 133
2. St. Bonaventure 100
3. La Salle 90
4. Fordham Univ. 61
5. Saint Louis 60
6. George Washington 58
7. George Mason 57