Four Records Fall on Day 2 of AE Championships
Worcester, Mass. – The VMI men's and women's swimming and diving teams broke four school records Friday on day two of the 2019 America East Championships, hosted by Worcester Polytechnic Institute. The Keydets broke three records on Thursday on the first day of the four-day conference championships.
Freshman Stephen Hopta set a new school record in the 500-freestyle preliminaries, swimming a 4:38.99 to break a six-year-old mark by almost five seconds. He was even faster in the finals, clocking a 4:32.09 to take fourth overall. Thomas Muldowney and Colin Gibbons also qualified for the finals in the men's 500 Free.
Freshman Sophie Svoboda broke her own school record twice in the women's 200-IM, recording a time of 2:06.91 in the prelims and 2:06.84 the finals to place seventh.
Senior Brady Gannon narrowly broke the program record in the men's 50-yard freestyle, racing to a time of 20.86 in the finals, bettering the old mark by .01 seconds. Ryan Schmitz (21.04), Nick Palmieri (21.34) and Jake Johnson (21.87) each qualified for the finals as well.
The men's 200-freestyle relay team of Gannon, Palmieri, Johnson and Schmitz swam a 1:23.53 to take third and break the school record. Gannon re-broke his 50-meter freestyle record with a 20.71 on the lead leg.
Ryan Cooper earned a spot in the men's 200-IM finals with a time of 1:59.86 and John Reed took eighth in the 3-meter diving competition.
Morgan Davis swam a 25.70 in the women's 50-freestyle preliminaries.
Day 3 events begin at 10:00 a.m. with trials in 11 events, men's and women's 400 Individual Medley, 100-yard butterfly, 200-yard freestyle, 100-yard backstroke and women's 1 meter diving. Finals begin at 5:30 p.m. and the entire day of competition can be streamed live on AmericaEast.TV.
2019 America East Swimming & Diving Championships
Team Standings through Day 2 (15 events)
Women
- New Hampshire (290)
- UMBC (276.5)
- Maine (191.5)
- Vermont (176)
- Binghamton (161)
- VMI (84)
- Stony Brook (83)
Men
- UMBC (415.5)
- Binghamton (334)
- Maine (181.5)
- VMI (177)
