The Missouri Tigers men and women both walked away with wins against their increasingly-competitive in-state foes from Missouri State, with the Tigers men winning 155-88 and the Tigers women taking the day 139-97.
Despite the lopsided margin, though, its hard to imagine Missouri State coming away from the meet disappointed. Their men started off the meet with an electric 3:15.55 in the 400 medley relay. That ranks the Missouri State Bears, of all teams, 4th in the country this year (3rd coming into Friday evening) behind only Florida, USC, and Michigan.
The splits:
- Paul Le – 48.05
- Isaac Springer – 54.47
- Vitali Baryshok – 58.69
- Uvis Kalnins – 44.34
Missouri State took the second event of the day as well, the 1000 free, with a 9:17.91 from Miguel Davila, but after that, the Tigers came around and really dominated the rest of the meet. Eegan Groome took a win in both the 200 free (1:39.15) and the 500 free (4:32.49); and the Missouri men were as usual very good in the 200 yard breast. Sam Tierney took that race in 1:59.49. He’s up against an amazing SEC 200 breaststroke group this season (they currently hold the top 5, and 6 of the top 7 best times in the country), but he’s certainly capable of holding his own against that group.
This unusual event selection saw no 100 yard races of the non-freestyles, but Missouri State’s Paul Le did win the 200 back in 1:45.77. He’s been under 1:46 twice this season, and nobody else from a mid-major conference has been better than 1:47-mid.
Le also won the 50 free in 20.48, with Missouri’s Max Grodecki topping the field in the 100 free by over a second in 44.90.
The score was closer in the women’s meet, but unlike the men, the Missouri women exhibitioned the meet’s last two events.
The best swims of the day for the Missouri women came in the 200 backstroke. There, sophomore Madison Bridges won in 1:59.94, with senior teammate Andrea Marko taking 2nd in 2:03.64. Those are season-best times for both swimmers.
Missouri will be off for two weeks before beginning their big mid-season invitational, the Mizzou Invite, on November 21st; Missouri State’s women host a dual with Arkansas on Saturday, and then they too will be on a short hiatus before Northwestern’s TYR Invitational that begins on November 22nd.
…once again, Mizzou brought a gun to a knife fight by suiting up in LZR’s against Bears in briefs. Ugh.
From what I saw, there were 4 men and 4 women in three year old fastskin pros. Only one of them was an event winner, and she won by almost 4 seconds. The suits had nothing to do with beating Missouri State, Coach Rhodenbaugh just wanted to see where a couple of the swimmers were before taper starts for the Mizzou Invite.
Well considering there were three suited up in the pic that swimswam tweeted out I am gonna go out on a limb and guess there were probably more than 4. And while I know some of their top guys weren’t suited, the tech probably magnified their depth pretty well. No worries, MU is tough and they should be winning meets like this… But why can’t we just have a good old fashioned rock em sock em dual some day where fans don’t walk away feeling like they should get a partial refund on their admission?
As a person with no strong ties to either school, I find it hard to believe that Missouri would suit up just because they were so concerned with winning the dual meet. Especially when Missouri almost doubled the score of Missouri State by the end of the meet. Overall, Missouri is a much better team right now, period. No need to make excuses.
Title?
I am pretty sure that 58.69 on the fly split is supposed to be 48.69! If not then they desperately need a flyer!