The second full day of competition at the 2013 Longnecker Invitational/PAC Championships/AMCC Championships was, true to form, just as exciting as the first and culminated in a spectacular finish in the men’s 800 free relay. The team races that were close at the top after Thursday night’s competition hardly budged, and the race for the women’s AMCC title actually tightened.
The Grove City Wolverines grew their lead in the PAC and overall invitational women’s race from 50 to 84 points over the Westminster Titans (588-504), while the Saint Vincent Bearcats maintained their solid hold on third place (397). It is unlikely that any of those three teams, or the fourth-place Washington and Jefferson Presidents (258), will change places in today’s meet.
In the men’s PAC and invitational race, Westminster doubled its first-night lead from five points to ten, now holding a 481-471 edge over Grove City. The Penn State Behrend Lions (415), while not sliding suddenly into a distant third, has fallen off the pace, trailing Westminster by 66 when their deficit had only been 23. W & J kept its fourth-place status with 294 points, and is in a good position to keep it, as fifth-place Saint Vincent is 41 points behind.
The AMCC men’s race continues to be thoroughly and completely super-dominated by Behrend. Their team lead grew to 170 points (272-102 over the Pitt-Bradford Panthers), and they continue to have more points than the other three teams combined. The AMCC women’s meet, however, tightened over the second day. Behrend’s 10-point advantage over the Cabrini Cavaliers evaporated, and the Cavaliers have now inched into a 146-145 lead with one day of competition remaining.
The women’s 200 medley relay got things off to a quick start, with the champion Grove City women earning a B-cut with a time of 1:46.13. Saint Vincent (1:48.89) got their second runner-up relay, holding a small lead on Westminster (1:50.63) for the first 150 yards before running away in the freestyle to win by a full body-length. In the AMCC, MaryEllen Spooner’s (Behrend) strong backstroke finish was enough to make Bre Smith’s (Cabrini) conference-best freestyle split of no avail, as the Behrend women defeated the Cavaliers by nearly two seconds (2:00.29-2:02.07).
The men’s relay was led from start to finish by Behrend, who won three of the four legs and finished in a solid B-cut time of 1:32.48. Not to be outdone, Westminster earned its own B-cut (1:33.08) as the runner-up. Grove City finished a distant third at 1:36.52.
The B-cuts continued in the women’s 400 IM, as Grove City’s Jenny Ryan led the pack throughout the race, her lead growing progressively wider and wider as the laps went on. Her final time of 4:33.74 gave her a seven-and-a-half-second victory of Westminster’s Erin Erdley. Grove City’s Keegan Reed nearly swam down Erdley for second place, but fell short by just over half a second (4:41.25 versus 4:41.81). Franciscan got its first AMCC win of the meet with Aimee Vunovich’s 5:23.26.
In the men’s 400 IM, the winner was not clear at any point in the first 300 yards of the race. Saint Vincent’s Zach Ligus split the fastest butterfly time, and he and Grove City’s David Bossert were virtually tied at the end of the backstroke. Kevin Dunigan from W&J came on with a massive charge in the breaststroke that put him into the lead, which he held through the first 35 yards of the freestyle. At the point, Bossert charged back into the lead and pulled away from the field, touching first in 4:09.94, followed by Dunigan at 4:12.70. Grove City’s Adam Walker, who put together a stellar back half of his own, overcame a seven-second deficit to outdo Ligus for third place (4:14.75-4:15.31). Behrend’s Brian Mong won the AMCC title in 4:24.89, attempting his own comeback against Westminster’s Jimmy Newman in the consolation final, but ultimately fading back.
The women’s 100 fly was fairly straightforward from a race perspective, as Grove City’s Kait Riesmeyer cruised to a victory in B-cut fashion (56.91). It was notable, however, for its runner-up finisher, Alyssa Taylor, who also earned a B-cut (57.71), becoming the first swimmer in Saint Vincent school history to do so in an individual event (the Bearcats’ 200 free relay earned the school’s first B-cut of any kind in a time trial earlier in the day). Cabrini’s Alexis Drew took home the AMCC title (1:05.34).
The men’s 100 fly saw a come-from-behind victory by Westminster’s Alan Nedley. After coming in fourth after the 50, more than half a second out of the lead, Nedley dominated the second half of the race, outsplitting Behrend’s Clay Altemose by .82 seconds to earn a quarter-second win (50.89-51.14). Cabrini’s Evan Strickland gave the AMCC two of the top three places with his 52.08 performance for third place overall.
Angela Palumbo from Grove City won the women’s 200 free in record-setting fashion, as her B-cut time (1:52.29) broke the invitational, pool, and PAC meet record. Like her teammate in the 400 IM, she built an early lead that she never came close to relinquishing. Another of her teammates, Tori Baker, finished a distant second at 1:55.10. In the AMCC, Melinda Mackenzie earned her second conference title of the year with a 2:06.42.
The men’s 200 free, like the 400 IM, was rather more complicated than the women’s race. The leaders were four abreast at the 50, and Behrend’s Javier Solivan and Saint Vincent’s Matt Linebaugh managed to inch ahead with each other to be virtually tied for first at the halfway mark. In the fifth length, however, Westminster’ Jake Pletz took over the race and never looked back, swimming to a clear victory in 1:42.04, outdoing Solivan by nearly a full second. Linebaugh faded to fourth (1:44.89) as Grove City’s Eric Fairchild nearly negative-split the race to finish third (1:43.21).
The women’s 100 breaststroke saw another Grove City victory, with Kaley “Cats” Hess destroying the field in a 1:06.73. Saint Vincent’s Mary Kate Kenna, the runner-up, was more than two seconds behind, at 1:09.09. The AMCC champion, Mary McCulloch (who sang the national anthem on Friday morning with two minutes’ advance notice from her coach, who had volunteered her the night before), earned a spot in the championship finals and finished at 1:11.50.
Unlike other men’s races, the 100 breast victor was not in doubt at any point. Westminster’s Matt Baurle had broken the second oldest conference record in the books (from 2001) in prelims, and then proceeded to re-break his own record with an even better B-cut time of 56.40. His teammate, Dan Gutmann, finish second with a B-cut of his own (57.56). Behrend’s Justin Pritchard claimed the AMCC championship (1:00.04).
The women’s 100 backstroke saw a highly competitive consolation final, with several lead changes in the second 50 of the race. The championship final saw Grove City’s Lauren Cassano establish a clear lead after the 50 on her way to a full-second victory, complete with a B-cut (58.36), over Westminster’s Kelsey Reott (59.40), who had earned the top spot in the prelims. MaryEllen Spooner, who broke her own AMCC conference record in prelims with a 59.96, proceeded to win the conference title with a slightly slower 1:00.26.
The men’s 100 back was perhaps the fastest race of the night, with no fewer than 3 B-cuts being earned in the event. Westminster’s Steven Brooks (50.47) upended defending invitational champion Dan Simon (50.78) from Behrend, in spite of a furious charge by Simon in the second 50. Simon’s teammate Clay Altemose earned his second top-3 finish of the night with a 51.32.
In the women’s 800 free relay, Grove City cruised to a victory by nearly the length of the pool, in spite of resting some of the best swimmers for a 400 medley relay time trial directly afterward (which resulted in a 3:51.43 time, nearly two seconds better than their finals time from Thursday night). The 800 relay team’s time of 7:43.83 outdid runner-up Westminster (7:59.09) by fifteen seconds. Cabrini won their first AMCC relay title with an 8:46.40.
The Titans avenged their women’s 800 free relay defeat with a victory of their own in what was perhaps the most entertaining event of the night. With crowd energy usually reserved for much shorter relays, the men’s relay saw three different teams establish clear leads over the course of the race. Behrend moved out in front in the first leg behind a solid effort from Javier Solivan. In the second leg, Saint Vincent took over on a 1:45.19 split from Matt Linebaugh. Saint Vincent’s lead lasted through much of the first 100 of the third leg, before Alan Nedley moved Westminster firmly into the lead. The fourth leg was a race of Dan Gutmann holding off Grove City’s Eric Fairchild. The Wolverines had started the race in distant fourth place, caught Behrend on the third leg, and then moved into second ahead of Saint Vincent in the first half of the final leg. Fairchild’s 1:41.79 split brought him within a body-length of Gutmann, but the Titans held on for the win, giving them a ten-point team lead, instead of a two-point deficit, at the end of the night.
