March 4, 2006
EAST MEADOW, N.Y. - The Eastern Intercollegiate Swimming League Championship concluded Saturday night with the Navy men's swimming and diving team placing sixth in the nine-team event. The Mids totaled 700 points over the three-day meet held at the Nassau County Aquatic Center on New York's Long Island.
Princeton won the championship with a score of 1,393 points.
Navy's final point total and placing were both an improvement upon last year when the Mids placed eighth with a score of 686 points. Another improvement for the Mids was the number of athletes who advanced to championship finals during the meet. One year after qualifying seven Mids for finals, Navy placed nine athletes into championship finals this year.
"We are pleased we were able to move up from our finish of last year," said Navy head coach Bill Roberts. "We are already looking forward to next year and to continuing that trend.
"A lot of the credit for our improvement goes to our senior class. They led us all weekend and throughout the season."
Navy's final evening began with David Guthmann (Fr., Waxhaw, N.C.) placing 16th and team captain Brad Snyder (Sr., St. Petersburg, Fla.) placing 22nd in the 1650 freestyle. Guthmann recorded a time of 16:06.75 in the race, while Snyder posted a time of 16:18.21.
Kevin Mukri (Jr., Silver Spring, Md.), who holds the Navy record in the 200 backstroke with a time of 1:47.40, posted the school's second-fastest time in the event during Saturday morning's trials session with a time of 1:49.02, a clocking which advanced him to the evening's championship final. Mukri improved upon his swim from earlier in the day by nearly one second to place third in the championship final with a clocking of 1:48.08.
Also swimming Saturday night in the event for Navy was Billy Vey (Fr., Huntersville, N.C.), who placed fourth in the 'B' level final with a career-best time of 1:51.14.
Two days after competing in the championship final of the 50 freestyle, Navy standout sprinters Mike Linn (Sr., Newhall, Calif.) and Joe Smutz (Sr., Marriottsville, Md.) qualified for Saturday's championship final in the 100 free. Linn, the Navy record holder in the event, placed third in the final with a time of 44.22, while Smutz, who has posted the second-fastest Navy time in the 100 free, placed fifth Saturday night with a clocking of 44.56.
A trio of Mids placed in the 'C' level final of the 200 breaststroke, with Kevin Kysiak (So., Western Springs, Ill.) winning the race in a career-best time of 2:06.36. John Kennedy (Jr., Richmond, Va.) placed fourth in the event with a time of 2:07.98, with Christopher Jenkins (So., Chicago, Ill.) following in fifth place with a clocking of 2:08.45.
The last individual swimming event of the championship saw Navy's Tyler Hill (So., Houston, Texas) win the 'C' level final of the 200 butterfly with a time of 1:51.67. His time won the race by one-half of a second and was the sixth-best time in the event in Navy history.
In the three-meter diving final, defending champion Kevin Teague (Jr., Lexington, Ky.) placed fourth with a score of 328.60 points. Harvard's Danil Rybalko won the event with a score of 373.10.
Navy closed the championship by having its 400 freestyle relay team of Andrew Plumb (Jr., Altadena, Calif.), Matt Wood (So., Evergreen Park, Ill.), Linn and Smutz record a time of 2:59.86 to place third.
Although the Mids recorded good times at the start of the relay, the Mids found themselves in seventh place by four seconds halfway through the race. Linn started the rally by recording the fastest third leg of the race with a 43.99, then Smutz posted the second-fastest final leg with a time of 43.70 to pull the Mids into third place and within 2.8 seconds of event-winner Harvard.
"What a great finish by our relay team," said Roberts. "They were down early, but kept fighting their way back throughout the race."
The overall clocking ranks fourth in Navy history.
