University of Louisville
AAC Championships
Men's and Women's Swimming Take Over First at The American Championships
February 21, 2014 | Swimming & Diving
Feb. 21, 2014
The University of Louisville men's and women's swimming and diving team are both sitting atop of the standings after the third day of competition at The American Athletic Conference Championships Friday evening at the Ralph Wright Natatorium.
"I mentioned to the team before tonight's final that I think this morning's session was one of the most inspired that I can remember in my 11 years here, because there were a lot of people swimming at a really high level of performance," said U of L head coach Arthur Albiero. I am very pleased with the day. I think they responded. I did challenge them after last night and they responded.
The standings for the women are: Louisville, 654; SMU, 443; Rutgers, 378; UConn, 309; Cincinnati, 271; and Houston, 228. For the men, Louisville leads with 718.5 followed by SMU, 503; UConn, 475.5; and Cincinnati, 345.
"I think it's been a very good championship, a credit to all the teams. There's some really good performances from all teams. The spirit is fantastic, it's a great environment for competition. The crowd has been awesome and it's fun to be in that environment.
The Cardinals won six individual races and a relay, with four A-cuts, 2 NCAA Invites, and eight B-cut times.
"Four school records on the day, it's definitely what we train for and those are putting the performances together when they count.We capitalized on some opportunities, we missed a couple, but I think we moved ourselves into a better position with more NCAA qualifications, and ultimately that's still our target," said Albiero.
In the first race of the evening, Louisville senior Tanja Kylliainen set the tone with an NCAA A-cut, a pool and a school record time of 4:04.96, nine seconds ahead of the rest of the 400-IM field. She led wire to wire, increasing her lead from four body lengths to almost a full length of the pool. Teammate Abigail Chin was third with a B-cut time of 4:16.48. Carly Munchel was eighth with a time of 4:24.58.
In the men's 400-IM, UConn's Sawyer Franz chased down the U of L favorite Nolan Tesone, touching in 3:47.88. Tesone clocked a 3:48.39. Jake Schultz was third, posting a 3:54.53 and Bryan Draganosky tied for fifth in 3:57.54.
In a wild final lap, Marne Erasmus edged U of L sophomore Kelsi Worrell in the 100-fly with a time of 52.05. Worrell went 52.48, both were NCAA A-cuts. Cardinal Devon Bibault was third in 54.04 (B-cut) and Mary Mittel touched sixth in 55.34.
Louisville swept the top four spots in the men's 100-fly, led by Pedro Coutinho's B-cut time of 47.04. Josh Quallen (47.18), Aaron Young (47.19), David Boland (47.92) all made B-cuts. Juan Lopez scored with an eighth place finish and a time of 48.91.
Cincinnati's Jacqueline Keire put up an NCAA Invite time of 1:44.73 for the 200-free win. Nina Rangelova was second in 1:45.00. Andrea Kneppers was the first Card into the wall with a 1:47.63 B-cut. Breann McDowell was fifth in 1:48.36 and Abigail Houck was eighth in 1:49.29.
Defending NCAA Champion Joao De Lucca won his signature event with a pool record time of 1:32.29 for an NCAA A-cut. Matthias Lindenbauer was second 1:35.92 and Trevor Carroll was third in 1:35.95 made it a sweep and both had B-cuts.
In the 100-breast, Andrea Cottrell put up an NCAA invite time of 59.88 for the win. Gisselle Kohoyda was fourth in 1:02.34 and a B-cut. Lucy Kramer picked up points with a seventh place and a time of 1:03.39.
The Cardinals swept the top three spots in the men's 100-breast led by Thomas Dahlia's NCAA invite time of 52.74 which is the fourth fastest time in the nation. Addison Bray was second in 53.67 and Kameron Chastain was third in 53.68.
In the women's 100-back, Erica Belcher was the top finisher with a third place time of 53.87, followed by Mackenzie Buss's 53.99, Krissie Brandenburg's 54.27 and Kristin Stein's 54.30, which were all NCAA B-cuts.
The men went 1-2-3-4 in the men's 100-back led by Grigory Tarasevich's 47.23. Aaron Young was second in 47.67 and Caryle Blondell picked up fourth in 48.01.
In the men's 3-meter diving, SMU swept the top three spots. Sean Piner was the top men's finisher with a fifth place score of 317.75.
In the women's 400-medley relay, SMU held on for the win in a tightly contested race, posting an NCAA A-cut time of 3:33.21. U of L's Erica Belcher (53.95), Andrea Cottrell (59.58), Kelsi Worrell (51.36) and Krissie Brandenburg (49.10) put up an A-cut of their own with a time of 3:33.91.
In the men's 400-medley relay, the foursome of Grigory Tarasevich (47.70), Thomas Dahlia (53.26), Aaron Young (47.11) and Joao De Lucca (42.87) combined to post a 3:10.94.
The Cardinals are back in action for the last day of the championship with prelims beginning at 10 a.m. and the finals at 6 p.m.
