ITHACA, N.Y. – The Ithaca College men's swimming & diving program welcomed nine other schools to South Hill on Friday for the first evening of the 12
th Annual Bomber Invitational. On the first evening of competition events included the 500-yard freestyle, the 200-yard IM, 50-yard freestyle, 200-yard medley relays and 3-meter diving. This year the Bombers are competing against Hartwick College, Alfred University, Middlebury College, Hamilton College, the University of Rochester, Nazareth College, Vassar College, Susquehanna University and Union College.
Leading after day one are the Bombers who have totaled 382 team points. Behind them are Middlebury College (278), University of Rochester (266.5), Hamilton College (211.5) and Hartwic College (166) rounds out the top-five.
The first event that swimmers competed in on Friday was the 500-yard freestyle that saw Ithaca gain valuable team points as they had swimmers finish second, fourth, fifth and sixth. Leading the way for IC with his second-place finish was
Matthew Stevens who put together a season-best time of 4:44.00. Finishing fourth was
Ryan Cooke (4:44.65), followed by
Santiago Ludwig (4:45.28) and
James Kissel (4:46.22). It was Middlebury's Riley Griffis besting the field with a recorded time of 4:40.91.
In the 200-yard IM, Ithaca's
Matthew Janssen was the top finisher for the Bombers as he shaved two seconds off his previous best time of the season to take home second-place with a recorded time of 1:55.45. Union's Matthew Kenvin had a strong performance winning his heat and besting the field by nearly four seconds with his time of 1:51.84.
Michael Paulos put together a sixth-place finish with a time of 1:56.14, which earned his team 24 points towards the team score.
Speed was the name of the game in the 50-yard freestyle and Ithaca's
James Collishaw impressed as the senior won the eighth and final heat of the evening with a time of 20.39, which was also good for first-place overall. Right behind him coming in second was teammate
Matthew Mitros who swam a time of 20.65, shaving nearly a second off his previous best of the season.
In diving action, they competed on the 3-meter boards which saw Ithaca's
Ethan Godfrey take home first place. The junior who has been returning to form put together an 11-dive total of 529.85, which was 80 points higher than Jack Armstrong (439.85) from Hartwick who finished in second place.
The first relay of the Bomber Invite was the 200-yard medley relay, which saw another Ithaca first-place finish.
James Collishaw,
Michael Paulos,
Santiago Ludwig and
Matthew Mitros teamed up to put together a time of 1:31.25, which proved to be nearly three seconds faster than Hamilton's "A" relay team who finished second with a recorded time of 1:34.21.
The Bombers are back in action tomorrow with day two of the Bomber Invitational, starting at 10 a.m. with the 200 freestyle relay. The 400 IM, 100 butterfly, 200 freestyle and 400 medley relay will wrap up the morning session. Diving then begins at 1 p.m. with the 1-meter before breaking for the afternoon.
The evening session is slated to begin at 6 p.m. with the 200-yard butterfly, followed by the 100-yard backstroke, 100-yard breaststroke and 800-yard freestyle relay.
