Purdue University hosted Big Ten foe Michigan Friday night, splitting the men’s and women’s meets.
The Boilermaker women swept the relays and Carly Mercer was great in the sprint frees to lead Purdue (ranked 19th in our mid-season power rankings) past the #25 Wolverines 164.5-135.5. On the men’s side, #4 Michigan had 7 different swimmers win 9 events en route to a 176-124 win over Purdue, which sat 18th in the men’s power rankings.
Mercer went 22.95 to win the 50 by nearly a full second, then followed that up with a dominating 49.47 100 free victory. That was evidence of Purdue’s sprinting prowess, which Michigan had no answer for tonight, despite picking up wins in all three of the non-free strokes.
Ali DeLoof won the 100 back (54.42), Angie Chokran the 100 breast (1:03.27) and Marie Georger the 200 back (2:00.78) for Michigan. The Wolverines also got three wins from Courtney Beidler, who took the 200 fly (2:00.12), 500 free (4:50.86) and 400 IM (4:19.07).
But despite that dominance in the odd-strokes, Michigan whiffed on a huge points opportunity in the 200 medley relay. Despite winning by over two seconds in the meet’s opening event, Michigan’s top team was disqualified for a false start on butterflyer Zoe Mattingly, giving the win (and 11 points) to Purdue. All-in-all, that was an 18-point swing right out of the gates in a meet that came down to 29 points at the end of the day.
Purdue also won the 400 free relay in 3:25.74 with the team of Carly Mercer, Gracie Hernandez, Nika Karlina Petric and Carly Marshall.
Francesca Marr won the 200 breast for Purdue – the breaststroke races were both a tight battle between Marr and Michigan’s Angie Chokran. Marr won the 200 by just .3 and Chokran took the 100 by just .4.
Purdue was also unstoppable on the boards. Diver Casey Matthews won on 1-meter (325.28) and 3-meter (351.75) in 1-2 finishes for the Boilermakers. Other Purdue winners were Meagan Lim in the 100 fly (54.95) and Allie Davis in the 200 free (1:49.18).
The last winner for Michigan was Kelsey Cummings, who won a lengthy battle with Nika Karlina Petric in the 1000 free, going 9:57.31.
On the men’s side, Michigan rolled to a big win behind double-winners Connor Jaeger and Richard Funk. Jaeger won the 200 free and 500 free, battling his own teammates in both. His 1:37.52 barely clipped Justin Glanda in the 200, and he went 4:27.02 to outlast Michael Wynalda in the 500.
Funk swept the breaststrokes, topping Purdue’s rising Lyam Dias, who has had a great season so far. Funk proved he was in a league of his own, though, going 54.67 for an easy 100 breast win and then leading the 200 breasts wire-to-wire, going 2:00.59. He was followed by usual butterflyer Dylan Bosch, who went 2:01.77 to get in ahead of Dias.
Purdue’s Guillermo Blanco took advantage of Bosch’s absence in the 200 fly to win in 1:48.92 over Wolverine Kyle Whitaker. Blanco picked up his second win in the 400 IM, going 3:51.02 to beat out Connor Jaeger.
Michigan swept the backstrokes (Peter Brumm in the 100 back, 49.67, and Ryutaro Kamiya in the 200 back, 1:45.91), a promising sign given their struggles there so far this year, but Purdue answered back by sweeping the diving events (Jamie Bissett, 366.53 on 1-meter, Alec Back, 366.75 on 3-meter).
The other Purdue winner was Danny Tucker, who beat Michigan’s Bruno Ortiz in a tight battle for the 50 free. Tucker was 20.25 to Ortiz’s 20.27.
Tucker also went 19.6 anchoring Purdue’s 200 free relay, which won 1:20.56 to 1:20.74 over Michigan. The Boilermaker relay was Austin Flager, Matt Friede, Adam Johnston and Tucker.
Michigan took the 400 medley relay to open the meet, though, by 4 seconds. The team of John Wojciechowski, Richard Funk, Dylan Bosch and Bruno Ortiz went 3:15.18 – that included a great 53.3 breaststroke split from Funk and a 47.6 fly from Bosch.
Wojciechowski won the 100 fly later in the meet, going 48.98. The other winners for Michigan were Anders Nielsen in the 1000 free (9:19.37) and Justin Glanda in the 100 free (44.45).
John Klinge does a great job at Purdue- this is a nice win for the Boilermakers.
Cheers to the Purdue women on a nice win. Some great swims coming off of 16 hours of travel ending yesterday afternoon. Some of their best in season swims so far this year. I am impressed. Way to be Boilermakers…This coming from a MI fan.
And Purdue just got back from training yesterday…from an overnight flight from Hawaii. Pretty tired group of kids I bet
Unless one just read the headlines? Maybe put it in a more positive note favoring that Purdue won, not that Michigan lost it on a DQ
You make it sound like the relay DQ was the reason Purdue won. They won by 30 points.
I pointed out in the story that the DQ was a 19-point swing in a meet decided by 29. Never implied Michigan would have won – just wanted to convey that the relay DQ put Michigan in a big hole early, a hole that turned out to be insurmountable.