UMBC Sweeps 2019 America East Titles; Gliese Breaks Another Record

AMERICA EAST – WOMEN & MEN

• Thursday, February 14 – Sunday, February 17
• WPI Sports and Recreation Center, Worcester, MA (Eastern Time Zone)
• Defending Champion: UMBC Men (2x) & New Hampshire Women (1x) (results)
• Live results
• Live Video
• Championship Central
• Day 1 Recap
• Day 2 Recap
• Day 3 results
• Day 4 results
• Full results

Buoyed by a 2nd conference record from Alexander Gliese, the UMBC men and women roared to runaway titles on Sunday evening to close the America East Conference Championship meet. For the UMBC, this was a 3rd-straight AEC title (2013, 2018, 2019), and 5th-straight overall (including 3 CCSA titles during the interim period where the AEC didn’t sponsor swimming). The win sends out a senior class without a loss at the meet. For the women, they reclaimed the throne after New Hampshire won last season, and now have 4 titles in the last 5 seasons.

Award Winners:

• Female – Most Outstanding Swimmer – Maine’s Juliana McDonald, broke Meet Records in 50 and 100 yard freestyles.
• Male – Most Outstanding Swimmer – UMBC’s Alexander Gliese, broke Meet Records in 100 and 200 yard backstrokes
• Female – Most Outstanding Diver – Binghamton’s Amanda McGraw, won the 1-meter and took 2nd on 3-meter
• Male – Most Outstanding Diver – Elijah Wright, UMBC, won the men’s 1-meter and 3-meter events.
• Female – Dave Alexander Coaches’ Award (most points) – UMBC’s Hania Moro
• Male – Dave Alexander Coaches’ Award (most points) – UMBC’s Alexander Gliese
• Female – Elite 18 Award (highest GPA) – Vermont’s Sophia Smith, 3.89 GPA, elementary education
• Male – Elite 18 Award (highest GPA) – UMBC’s Connor Ganley, 3.97 GPA, chemical engineering

Women

1. UMBC (894.5 points)
2. New Hampshire (723)
3. Vermont (510)
4. Maine (465.5)
5. Binghamton (449)
6. Stony Brook (185)
7. VMI (165)

Men

1. UMBC (1113.5 points)
2. Binghamton (774)
3. Maine (494.5)
4. VMI (483)

Men’s Meet – Day 4 Recap

While he only swam 1:44.09 in finals, UMBC senior Alexander Gliese broke the Conference Record with a 1:42.56 in prelims of the men’s 200 back. That swim crushed his old conferencce mark of 1:45.27 from last year’s meet, though it still projects to be well-short of the time needed for an NCAA invite. While his finals time was slower, he still easily won the race with the meet out of hand.

Gliese previously broke the Conference Record in the 100 back.

He was joined as an individual winner on Sunday evening by junior teammate Ilia Rattsev, who completed a sprint-free sweep of the meet with a 44.28 in the 100. The Russian-born Rattsev was last year’s America East Most Outstanding Male Swimmer, and has won 3-straight conference finals in the 100 free (including the 2017 CCSA Championship meet). He was faster, however, in the 100 free last year – 43.92.

Rattsev then helped UMBC put a gold star on their title by leading off the 400 free relay in 44.20, combining with Gliese (44.75), Tiago Asakawa (45.50), and Connor Ganley (45.49) to win the closing 400 free relay in 2:59.95 – almost 4 seconds ahead of the field.

UMBC swept the final day of racing at the meet.

Other Day 4 Winners:

• Jack Carlisle of UMBC won the men’s 200 fly in 1:49.80, just beating-out his teammate Matt Hoskins (1:49.86). The two were in a dead-heat for the entire race. As a sophomore and freshman, respectively, those two will have 2 more seasons of pushing each other in this event. The results were best times for both swimmers, but especially so for Hoskins, who dropped 5-and-a-half seconds over the course of the day in the 200 fly.
• UMBC’s Luis Galvan Cardenas defended his title in the 200 breaststroke, winning in 2:00.16. This was another Retriever 1-2, with Ganley touching 2nd in 2:01.30.
• UMBC’s perfect 6-for-6 day started with a mile win from sophomore Kai Wisner in 15:35.20. He was almost 10 seconds ahead of runner-up Haythem Abdlelkhalek, and UMBC went 1-2-3 in the race.

Women’s Meet – Day 4 Recap

UMBC’s Hania Moro kicked off the final session with a new school record in the women’s 1650 free, in 16:39.98 to earn her first individual event victory of the meet (after placing 2nd in the 200 and 500 frees). While the meet was, in effect, over coming into the day, a 1-2 finish in the  session’s opening race broke any hopes of a late New Hampshire comeback (on a day where New Hampshire would wind up winning more events, 3, than UMBC did).

That was actually UMBC’s only individual event of the final day of competition, which they bookended with a closing victory in the 400 free relay in 3:24.17.

The fastest split, and only sub-50, of that relay actually went to Maine senior Juliana McDonald, who would wind up winning Swimmer of the Meet, when she led off her team’s 2nd-place relay in 49.82. That was one of three sub-50 freestyles for her on the day: she swam a 49.57 in prelims of the individual event, to break the NEC Meet Record, and then added a 49.48 in finals to break the record again. Liza Baykova’s Conference record from 2018, done at a last chance meet, still stands at 49.31.

While New Hampshire wasn’t able to defend their title, they did end the day with 3 individual wins, including 2 from underclassmen that give them hopes of battling back next season. First, freshman Anna Metzler won the 200 back in 1:58.33, adding to an earlier win in the 500 free and a 2nd-place finish in the 400 IM. She ends her season with 3 New Hampshire Freshman Records.

Metzler hails from Germany, and is one of two Germans on the New Hampshire roster. The other, Vivi El-Sibay, also picked up a win on Sunday, topping the women’s 200 fly in 2:00.74. That’s her lifetime best in the race by 2 seconds.

Sandiwched in between the two was a 200 breaststroke win from Corinne Carbone, a junior, in 2:15.59.