Lennox' EISL record not enough

Junior Doug Lennox, who will be competing in the 2008 Summer Olympics for Puerto Rico, led the Tigers (7-1) during the three-day event, establishing a meet, pool and EISL record in the 200-yard butterfly. He clinched Princeton’s only individual championship for the second straight year and is the only Tiger swimmer with an NCAA automatic qualifying time — one minute, 44.36 seconds. Lennox was also Princeton’s top overall point scorer, placing second in the 100-yard butterfly and third in the 100-yard backstroke.

The Tigers started the meet well, finishing second in the 200-yard freestyle relay, but fell into a mild slump as the weekend continued. After a poor morning performance by the distance squad in the 500-yard freestyle, it was up to the mid-distance and sprint groups to get the ball rolling.

Junior Will Schaffer did just that, keeping on the heels of Harvard’s Geoff Rathgeber throughout the 200-yard individual medley, clinching second place with a time of 1:48.57. Sophomore Chris Quemena and freshman Colin Hanna also added some big points for the Tigers, finishing fourth and seventh respectively.

In the 50-yard freestyle, it was freshman Geoff Faux who stepped up and dropped some major time to grab third place, missing second by just .04 seconds.

The Princeton squad ended the first day of competition on a low note with a sixth-place finish in the 400-yard medley relay, placing the team 80 points behind Harvard, a margin that would only widen as the weekend continued.

“We were down … but our hopes were still high,” junior Easton Chen said. “We were definitely hoping to come back in day two and swim well, and … the possibility of catching up was still within striking range.”

Despite the sluggish start, the Tigers started to pick up the pace on the second day of competition, improving to a fourth-place finish in the 200-yard medley relay and earning top-10 finishes in the 1,000-yard freestyle. It would not be enough, however, to catch the Crimson squad, which won both events.

Schaffer and Hanna quickly brought the Tigers back on track with an exciting matchup between Schaffer and Navy’s Adam Meyer in the 400-yard IM. Falling behind in the first 150 yards, Schaffer shifted to a different gear with 100 yards of freestyle to go, closing the .3 second lead that Meyer had established through the backstroke and butterfly. But with 50 yards left, Meyer refused to go down and out-touched Schaffer at the very last moment, finishing in second with Schaffer in third. Hanna, who had fallen behind after 200 yards, fought hard in the back half of the course and maintained a full second between him and the rest of the field for a fourth-place finish.

The third day of competition was Princeton’s best, as the squad came together for the final push. Despite poor showings in the 500 and 1,000, the distance squad redeemed itself in the 1,650 with a third-place finish by junior Robert Griest and a fourth-place finish by freshman Patt Biggs.

In the 200-yard breaststroke, Schaffer was once again matched up against Rathgeber but fell behind after the first 50 and was unable to close the gap. Schaffer finished second, ending the meet as Princeton’s second-highest scorer, right behind Lennox.

In the diving portion of the meet, sophomores Daniel Dickerson and Michael Papageorge had a disappointing Thursday evening during the one-meter event, as they finished seventh and eighth respectively. Despite the poor one-meter performance, they rose to the occasion during the three-meter event, with Papageorge and Dickerson delivering a great assortment of dives, enough for second- and sixth-place finishes.

Despite the second-place finish, Princeton looks to rebound next year as it rebuilds with a brand new class.

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“I’m confident in the future of Princeton swimming,” Chen said. “Although we have a lot of ground to make up, with our new additions and minimal losses we should do better, and it definitely gives us confidence coming into next year.”

While the EISL championships mark the end of the season, Lennox and possibly a few others with top NCAA “B” times will represent the Tigers at NCAAs, which will be held March 27-29 at the University of Washington.