Males’s swimmers clinch third place out of 144 groups at CCS National Championships

Liberty University’s males’s swimming workforce wrapped up third place on this weekend’s College Club Swimming National Championships on the Greensboro (N.C.) Aquatic Club with one other stable efficiency in Sunday’s finals.

The Flames, who had positioned second to Purdue University prior to now three nationwide championship meets, landed in third behind solely Cal Poly and the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, groups that benefited enormously from the additions of NCAA Division I swimmers to their rosters.

“Cal Poly’s NCAA DI team got cut, so 17 of their guys are in the transfer portal for next year but are swimming at the club level this season,” Liberty Head Coach Heath Grishaw stated. “They set a bunch of meet records and won a bunch of events and won (CCS) nationals. UNC has four swimmers that swam for their NCAA team last year that we knew would do really well, especially in their relays. Everyone else in the College Club Swimming Nationals world, these are true club swimmers.”

The Flames had three finalists within the 100-yard Individual Medley with senior captain Dillon Delaney putting sixth in 51.37 seconds. Sophomores Malachi Caballero (fifteenth in 53.0) and Jonah Rees (seventeenth in 52.11) additionally scored 19 factors to carry Liberty’s complete in that occasion to 40.

After ending eighth in Saturday’s 400 freestyle relay in 3:05.52, incomes 38 workforce factors, the Flames settled for sixteenth and 20 workforce factors by posting a time of 1:24.82 within the 200 free relay, additionally anchored by senior Whittman Brown.

Junior Byron Long and Rees tied for thirteenth within the 200 backstroke, touching the wall in similar occasions of 1:52.99 to mix for 25 workforce factors, earlier than ending eighth and thirteenth, respectively, within the 200 IM in 1:54.43 and 1:55.24 for a mixed 32 workforce factors.

Delaney recorded 16 factors by putting tenth within the 50 breast stroke in 25.90 earlier than the Flames’ trio of junior Thomas Hill (sixth in 4:38.12), freshman Judah Fralic (eighth in 4:38.53), and senior Benjamin Bizou (twenty first in 4:49.49) racked up 46 workforce factors within the final occasion of the meet.

Complete scores can be found on-line.

“I thought coming in, it was going to be a dogfight for second through fifth place,” Grishaw stated of the workforce standings. “This year, we didn’t have the depth that we did last year. We have taken a bit of a hit, and don’t have some of the guys we had in the fall, so we lost some points, but we still did well. We just wanted to go out and swim fast and do what we’ve been training to do.”

By Ted Allen/Staff Writer