COBLESKILL, NY – The SUNYIT men's swimming team finished in third place out of five teams with 348 points at the North Eastern Athletic Conference Championships, which was held at SUNY Cobleskill this past Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
SUNYIT qualified for 19 of the 21 championship events and had season-best times in 20 out of the 21 races. The Wildcats also set NEAC records in three of the five relays they participated in, including the 200-yard freestyle with a time of 1:34.85, the 400-yard freestyle with a time of 3:30.68 and the 800-yard freestyle with a time of 7:48.57. They took third place in the other two, finishing the 200-yard medley in 1:52.12 and the 400-yard medley in 4:32.72.
Individually, freshman Gavin Craddock (New Paltz, NY/New Paltz) set two school records when he finished first in both the 100-yard breaststroke (1:08.67) and the 200-yard breaststroke (2:31.68), while classmate Jacob Ammons (Spencerport, NY/Spencerport) also set two school records when he finished second in both the 500-yard freestyle (5:19.56) and the 1650-yard freestyle (18:22.65) while finishing fourth in the 200-yard freestyle (1:58.55). Freshman Kory Parsons (Rome, NY/Holland Patent) took second in both the 200-yard IM (2:16.21) and the 200-yard backstroke (2:18.72) and placed fourth in the 100-yard backstroke (1:04.14), while freshman Chris Kassay (Lockport, NY/Starpoint) took second in the 200-yard freestyle with a school-record time of 1:53.06 in addition to a fourth place finish in the 50-yard freestyle (0:23.58) and a fifth place finish in the 100-yard freestyle (0:52.34). Rounding out the top Wildcat swimmers was sophomore Ryan Horn (Holland Patent, NY/Holland Patent), who took second in the 400-yard IM with a time of 5:04.93 and fourth in the 100-yard butterfly with a time of 1:07.17.
Gallaudet University won the championship with a score of 565 points and was led by junior Brian Bennett, who was named the NEAC Mal Swimmer of the Year. Wells College came in second with a score of 428, while Cazenovia came in fourth with a score of 274 and SUNY Cobleskill finished fifth with a score of 162.
For the complete list of the NEAC Men's and Women's Swimming & Diving All-Conference Selections, please click here.