The University of South Carolina hosted East Carolina University and the College of Charleston Saturday in the first meet for Charleston since the school announced it would be cutting its swimming & diving programs next year.
Both meets went to the host Gamecocks, who got double wins from six different swimmers.
Freshman Nils Wich-Glasen was probably the most impressive swimmer for South Carolina, winning the 200 breast in 1:58.48, which moves him to 8th in the nation so far this year.
On the men’s side, Tomas Peribonio, Marwan El-Kamash and Kevin Leithold each won two individual races. Peribonio took the 1000 free (9:24.44) and 200 back (1:52.12). He actually came directly off that 1000 to swim the 200 free, and took second to El-Kamash. El-Kamash was 1:39.88 there (Peribonio was 1:41.41), and also won the 500 free in 4:31.40. Leithold went the shorter route, winning the 100 breast (55.65) and 100 free (45.30).
For the women, Victoria Mitchell, Meredith Vay and Heather Merritt all won twice. Mitchell, a senior, won the distance races, going 9:58.25 in the 1000 and 4:54.26 in the 500. Vay and Merritt, both freshmen, picked up wins in slightly shorter races. Vay won the 200 free (1:51.13) and 50 free (24.03), while Merritt took both backstrokes, going 56.63 in the 100 and 2:01.87 in the 200.
South Carolina also swept diving, with Cole Miller sweeping the men’s events and Patty Kranz (1-meter) and Lauren Lamendola (3-meter) combining to win the women’s events.
College of Charleston got a pair of wins on the men’s side in what was surely an emotional meet for them. Earlier this week, the school met with the team to announce that it would cut its programs following the 2014-2015 season and shut down the school’s 40-year-old pool permanently.
Pablo Ortiz took the 200 fly on the men’s side, going 1:53.30 to beat South Carolina’s Bryce Kananowicz. His teammate Buckley Powell helped complete a sweep of the fly events, going 50.18 to win the 100 fly.
East Carolina had the meet’s only triple winner in Bailee Monahan. She won the women’s 200 fly (2:02.02), 100 fly (56.48) and 200 IM (2:05.26), plus swam on ECU’s winning 400 medley relay to open the meet.
ECU also got wins from Tori Angermeier (100 free, 51.64) and Vendela Norrman (200 breast, 2:18.44) for the women, and from Nikola Simic (50 free, 21.04) on the men’s side. ECU won three of the four relays, with only the men’s 400 medley going to South Carolina.
Other South Carolina winners included Ellen Johnson in the women’s 100 breast (1:03.74), Jonathan Boland in the men’s 100 back (50.18) and Jeremiah Bohon in the men’s 200 IM (1:54.30).