ITHACA, N.Y. – In the first event of the second day of the 2023 Liberty League Championships, the Ithaca College men's swimming & diving team captured first-place in the 200-yard freestyle relay with an NCAA B-Cut time. The Bombers sit in second as they've totaled 793 team points and trail RIT who had a big day and have now totaled 914 points.
The relay team of
Matthew Mitros,
Max Braithwaite,
Ben Young and
James Collishaw opened the night with a first-place finish in the 200-yard freestyle with an NCAA B-cut time, recorded time of 1:21.41. RIT made it a close finish down the stretch with the Tigers touching the final wall at 1:21.57.
Matthew Janssen grabbed a fourth-place finish in the 200-yard individual medley, finishing with a time of 4:08.05. He shaved over three seconds from his morning prelim time as RPI's Jake Fassora won the event at 4:03.19.
The Bombers had a pair of top-eight finalists in the 100-yard butterfly.
Santiago Ludwig took sixth-place with a time of 50.19 and
Ben Young took eighth-place with a time of 50.27.
Matthew Johnston took a fourth-place finish in the 200-yard freestyle with a time of 1:41.71.
Ryan Cooke followed with an eighth-place finish in 1:43.68. RPI's Mike Dowd who won the event not only achieved a B-cut, but also broke the championship and association record that had stood since 1997 with his time of 1:39.53.
Diving got underway on the 1-meter boards on Thursday. First year
Kian Long was the top Ithaca finisher as he put together a prelim score of 448.80 and then 462.85 in the finals that earned him fourth-place.
Zack Kalinowski finished seventh with a finals score of 392.65.
The night finished with the 400-yard medley relay where the Bombers relay team took second with a time of 3:21.05. The time swam by
Matthew Johnston,
Michael Paulos,
Santiago Ludwig and
Ben Young broke the previous IC record in the event. RIT took home first with a time of 3:18.16, which was a Liberty League Championship record.
The Liberty League Championships continue tomorrow with the 200-yard butterfly, 100-yard backstroke, 100-yard breaststroke, women's 1-meter diving and the 800-yard freestyle relay. Swimming preliminaries begin at 10 a.m., followed by diving preliminaries at 1 p.m. and finals for both at 6 p.m.
