Grand Prix: Minnesota concludes meet with win, shines amongst nation’s brightest
Saturday began with the home team capturing two top 10 finished in the 200 individual medley preliminary swim. Jakob Maly (1:48.89) and Luke Bushman (1:49.21) touched the wall in eighth and 10th place respectively. The Maroon and Gold followed suit in the 100 yard freestyle with Derek Toomey (fifth, 43.56) and Daryl Turner (10th, 44.55).
In the finals of the 200 yard individual medley, Kyler Van Swol topped the second heat with a time of 1:47.69. Teammate Maley, who swam in heat one, followed close behind clocking a time of 1:47.95.
Carl Newenhouse finished in fourth place in the 200 yard backstroke with a time of 1:45.80. Also swimming to a fourth place finish in both the preliminary and finals 1650 freestyle, junior CJ Smith clocked times of 14:52.73 and 15:06.22 respectively. This showed a vast improvement from his finals time in this event last year (15:24.71).
Toomey, in the 100 yard freestyle, had the highest seed time (42.60), the fastest time a swimmer previously attained in the event, though finished fifth in Saturday’s preliminary swim (43.56). The senior bettered his time from this event last year by more than 1.5 seconds.
Minnesota had the opportunity to overcome the unfortunate turn of events in the 800 freestyle relay By swimming against Purdue again in the 400 yard medley relay. The preliminary swam familiarly saw the Golden Gophers finish first (3:15.26), just head of their conference rival. In the finals, the team of Turner, Hatanaka, Van Swol and Toomey improved their time to 3:12.22 to win the swim. Minnesota’s team of Ryan Miksch, Paul Fair, Benjamin Bravence and Ian Gordon finished third in the finals (3:03.16).
With consistently faster times, the Golden Gophers showed great improvement from this point last season, paving the way for a successful second half to the current season. After a well deserved break, Minnesota will return to the University Aquatic Center for the Jean Freeman Invite on Friday, December 6.