‘A long time coming’: NYU swimming & diving displays on a monumental season

On Saturday, March 21, the NYU girls’s and males’s swimming and diving seasons got here to a momentous conclusion in Indianapolis: The girls gained an NCAA Division III National Championship for the primary time, whereas the boys earned a program-best end of runner-up.

The girls’s staff completed with 517 factors and a cushty 83.5-point lead over second-place Emory University. The males’s staff closed out its competitors with 388.5 factors, 48.5 factors behind champion Denison University.

“I think this was a long time coming for this program,” girls’s senior captain Kaley McIntyre mentioned. “To be a part of the team that finally did it was something I still don’t really even have words for.”

McIntyre led the ladies’s staff in accolades and achievements. Competing on the staff for the final 4 years, she completed her final collegiate match with a haul of 5 titles, and was named D-III Swimmer of the Year for the second 12 months in a row. McIntyre swept the 50 and 200-yard freestyle for the fourth 12 months in a row, scored her third 100-yard freestyle win at nationals and helped take gold within the 200-yard and 400-yard freestyle relays for the primary time — alongside junior Lian Jeong Engle and first-years Maeve O’Donnell and Llew Ladomirak.

Senior Nicole Ranile triumphed within the 200-yard butterfly, whereas O’Donnell gained the 100-yard backstroke. Ranile, Jeong Engle, Ladomirak and senior Emery Muller took the 800-yard freestyle relay title.

The males’s staff additionally introduced dwelling some {hardware}. Sophomore Max Nechydyuk gained the 400-yard particular person medley, and junior Greg Wehbe, graduate scholar Teddy Cross and sophomores Teddy McQuaid and Sean Li gained the 200-yard medley relay — setting a brand new program document with a time of 1:26.18. Cross additionally broke one other program document and notched a nationwide title together with his win within the 200-yard backstroke.

Two senior divers represented the ladies’s diving staff, exceeding head diving coach Todd Kolean’s expectations. Meera Kasturi and Isabella Reyes positioned fourth and twenty second, respectively, within the 1m diving preliminary spherical. Kasturi certified for the ultimate later that day and completed in third with a rating of 436.25. 

“I was kind of hoping they would finish in the top 16 and be honorable mention All-American,” Kolean instructed WSN. “She worked her butt off all year long, especially leading into these national championships. For her to end up third in the nation was a little bit of an overperformance.”

The girls earned a program-best runner-up outcome finally 12 months’s NCAAs — and had been aiming to come back out on prime for the reason that begin of this season, with the assistance of a number of new faces on the roster, McIntyre mentioned.

Despite retiring 4 swimmers and one diver from the earlier season, the ladies’s staff kicked off the brand new 12 months in a spectacular vogue, successful its first twin meet of the season 184-53 towards West Chester University of Pennsylvania on Oct. 11. The Violets’ solely loss in a twin meet got here later that month towards D-I Columbia University.

“My plan for our dual meets is to try and maximize the level of competition and put us in positions where we’re going to race really fast people, so when we get to NCAAs, we’d be ready for it,” head swimming coach Trevor Miele mentioned in an interview with WSN.

The girls’s staff constantly completed first in scoring invitationals, with the primary hosted on the Palladium Athletic Facility for the NYU Fall Invitational, the place the Violets completed first out of 4 groups on each days. They gained their first UAA Championship on the University of Chicago final month, inserting first out of eight groups all through the competitors, and managed to hold the momentum over to the NCAA D-III Championships.

Ajay Watanakun and Connor Vincent have been among the many seven swimmers and two divers that retired from the boys’s staff on the finish of final season, after tying a program-best end of fourth on the NCAAs. The Violets additionally gained all seven twin meets this season.

Throughout the season, the swimmers and divers weren’t simply targeted on successful their first-ever championships, but in addition supporting everybody on their groups. The upperclassmen who kind the Violets’ management core sought to make their youthful teammates really feel welcome in a brand new and aggressive setting, from making posters to assist one another at meets to uplifting fellow scholar athletes at on-campus sporting occasions.

“In high school, swimming can be incredibly individual,” McIntyre mentioned. “You can’t win a national title with one person, so it was just really cool to see them find their places and show up.”

Although the boys’s squad completed wanting a title, the staff is ready on taking first within the nation subsequent 12 months with some contemporary faces on the staff. Six swimmers and one diver shall be graduating May, whereas the ladies — who will gear as much as defend their championship title come subsequent season — have 4 retiring swimmers and two divers.

“We knew we would have to work for it, but we figured that we had a pretty good chance,” McQuaid mentioned. “Trevor really drilled into the fact that we have a good chance, so we should just take this opportunity and not waste it.”

Contact Sherry Chen at [email protected].