Wabash scored 45 top-five finishes Saturday in its opening swimming and diving meet of the season to defeat Albion College 163-137 at the Class of 1950 Natatorium.
The Little Giants won six individual races in addition to placing first in the final relay event of the afternoon
“We won the meet with depth which is a nice little cog for our team moving forward in the season,” Wabash head coach Brent Noble said. “We knew we had our returning national qualifiers but we lost a lot of depth from last year. We graduated some really sold swimmers who had been next guys in line for us. We had some freshman step up in their first collegiate meet, but we also had sophomores and juniors step up and fill some roles in ways they hadn’t done in the past.”
Jack Belford scored an early win in the 1650 free, outdistancing the rest of the field by 43 seconds with a first-place time of 16:35.65. Chris Dabrowski touched second at 17:18.43 while Arturo Granandos placed third at 17:38.03 for a clean sweep of the top-three spots by Wabash. Belford added another individual win in the 100 freestyle with a time of 49.13. Wyatt Tarter placed second (49.33), while Dylan Miller took fourth (51.66) and Joe Whitakerfinished fifth (52.86). Belford also finished second in the 100 butterfly (53.89). Kyle Louks picked up third-place points by finishing in 54.47, followed closely by teammates Clayton Highum(55.69) and Chris McGue (56.06) in fourth and fifth, respectively.
McGue won the 50 free by touching the wall in 22.30, just ahead of Tarter in second at 22.92. Miller scored a fourth-place finish with his time of 23.26. Elliot Johns‘ time of 54.64 gave him a win in the 100-yard backstroke. Dakota Rhodes finishes in 1:00.03 for fourth place ahead of David Johnson in fifth at 1:00.48. Joel Paquinpicked up the 500 freestyle victory with a time of 4:55.69. Dabrowski finished third (5:04.26) ahead of Granados in fourth place (5:04.72). Johns also placed second in the 200 free (1:48.22), Paquin finished third at 1:49.93 ahead of Louks in fourth (1:50.98).
The final individual win came on the three-meter diving board. Wabash finished 1-2 in that event. Aaron Embree posted the top score of 239.00 for the victory. Max Von Deylen finished with 214.65 points for second place. The duo also scored on the one-meter board for the Little Giants with Von Deylen tallying 234.55 points for third place and Embree finishing fourth with 230.45 points.
Zechariah Banks placed second in the 100-yard breaststroke by finishing in 1:0013, 3/100th of a second off the winning time. Josh Bleisch added fourth-place points with his time of 1:03.75. Sam Colaiacova took fifth place (1:07.49). Banks picked up another second in the 100-yard individual medley with his time of 55.61. Highum finished in 59.09 to place fifth. Banks added one more second-place finish in the 50 breaststroke (27.60) with Bleisch (28.57) and Colaiacova (30.66) finish fourth and fifth.
Highum scored a second-place finish in the 50 fly by touching the pad at 24.94. Charles Frey scored a fourth-place finish (25.41) ahead of teammate Scottie Ogle in fifth place (25.67). Johnson finished second in the 50 backstroke at 26.90. Rhodes place third (27.02). Dane William picked up fifth place with a time of 28.13.
Wabash won the final event of the meet — the 200-freestyle relay. Johns, Belford, Tarter, and McGue combined for a top time of 1:28.43. Miller, Rhodes, Whitaker, and Louks finished third in the relay with a time of 1:32.06. The Little Giants’ foursome of Rhodes, Banks, Louks, and Johns placed second in the 400-yard medley relay to open the meet, finishing in 3:39.81. Johnson, Bleisch, Highum, and McGue finished in 3:44.19 to place third.
“I am encouraged by some of the big performances we got from the first meet,” Noble said. “Several freshmen swam faster than they ever have and did it in their first collegiate meet. To do that early in the year without a taper or shave is encouraging. For now we have to keep building and keep moving forward.”
Wabash will compete at the Indiana Intercollegiates to be held next Saturday at Purdue University.
Swimming news courtesy of Wabash Swimming & Diving.