The Brandeis swimming and diving team hit the pool last weekend for the three-day Gompei Invitational in Worcester, hosted by Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). In the first day of competition the Judges were in eighth place overall and fifth among Division III teams at the event. Rookie Olivia Stebbins ’22 reached an A final and finished 10th place in the 200-yard breaststroke with a time of 2:32.69 in the finals. Emily McGovern ’21 placed 20th in the 200-yard breaststroke with a time of 2:35.76. In the B final of the 200-yard individual medley Claire Xu ’22 won with a time of 2:12.07, also earning the third fastest time in school history. Junior Natalya Wozab reached the B final with a time of 2:19.81 to place 20th. Rookie Lauren Howard ’22 swam in the 50-yard freestyle and came in 19th with a time of 25.13 seconds, ranking her third on the all time top 10 list. Rookie Abbie Etzweiler earned a top score for the women in the 1650-yard free with a time of 18:49.33, earning her 19th place and a fourth sport on the career list. Finally, for the women, Audrey Kim ’21 finished 18th in the 100 butterfly with a time of 1:00.29, while her prelims time was 1:00.12 which earned her third on the school’s record.
For the men, on the first day Richard Selznick ’21 led the men’s team with his victory in the 1650-yard freestyle. He finished with a time of 16:21.74 and won the race with six seconds to spare. This time was only two seconds off from Selznick’s personal best in the event and five seconds short of an NCAA’s ‘B’ cut while being his first time in this race in his career at Brandeis. Brandeis had three other swimmers making the A-finals, including Top 10 finishes. Tamir Zitelny ’20 placed fourth in the 100-yard breaststroke with a time of 50.25 seconds, which also placed him fourth on Brandeis’ All-Time Top 10. Rookie Brendon Lu ’22 came in sixth in the 200-yard breaststroke with a time of 2:09.97 placing him fourth on the Brandeis All-Time Top 10 finishes. Alex Wang ’22 scored in two events, placed 16th in the 200 breaststroke with a time of 2:13.65, which earned him eighth in the All-Time Top 10 finishes. Finally, Daniel Wohl ’21 earned seventh place in the 50 free with a time of 21.53 seconds, which also gives him third in the Top 10 All-Time finishes.
The women’s relay team placed 11th in the meet opening in the 200 medley with an all first-year squad. The men’s relay team placed fifth in the 800 free and the 200 medley squad placed 12th.
On the second day of competition, four women’s Brandeis swimming and diving records broke, including the 200-yard freestyle relay, which the men also broke. For the women, Howard, Uajda Musaku ’21, Annie Huang ’21 and Kylie Herman ’19 beat the 200 freestyle relay set in 2017 with a time of 1:25.10, which also earned them ninth place in competition. The women closed out the day with a ninth place finish in the 400 medley relay with a time of 4:02.06, only 0.19 off the fastest time for Brandeis set in 2009. For the men in the 200-yard freestyle relay, they earned sixth place, but broke a record that had stood since 2005, which was among the oldest swimming records in the Judge’s books.
On the final day of competition, the Judges finished eighth with 2016.5 points earned between the men and women. Seven Judges finished in the top 20. Huang finished 13th in the 100 IM with fourth all-time. Rookie Olivia Stebbins ’22 finished 13th in the 50th breaststroke and 4th all time. Matthew Arcemont ’20 finished 13th in the 100 IM and 3rd all-time. Herman finished 14th in the 200 butterfly. Howard finished 15th in the 100 freestyle and 6th all-time. Joe Beletti-Naccarato ’21 finished 19th in the 200 backstroke and Chase Chen ’21 finished 20th in the 50 breaststroke.
The Judges are back in the pool on Dec. 8 at Colby for their final meet of the year.
