In three days of complete dominance, the Princeton men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams proved why they are the ones to beat in the Ivy League this year.
The Bucknell Invitational, held from Dec. 4 to Dec. 6, was a great opportunity for the Tigers to demonstrate their strengths, and both squads left every other team in the dust on the way to commanding victories.
The women finished the meet with a total of 2,002 points, far and away the best finish at the tournament. The Tigers ended the third day of competition more than 600 points ahead of second-place-finisher Bucknell; no other team came even close.
Particularly impressive on the final day were senior co-captain Alicia Aemisegger’s and sophomore Aislinn Smalling’s performances in the mile, where they took first and second place, respectively, with times of 16 minutes, 1.79 seconds and 16:58.43. Aemisegger’s time set a new pool record, and her large margin of victory and incredible time should propel her to the top of this week’s national rankings for the mile.
The men also finished head and shoulders above second-place Columbia, with a total of 1,609, nearly 500 more than Columbia. Sophomore Jon Christensen pointed to three swimmers in particular who had notable performances on the weekend.
“I would definitely single out [junior] Colin Hanna in the distance and [400-yard individual medley] events, [senior] tri-captain Christopher Quemena in the 100 and 200 freestyles and [sophomore] Colin Cordes in the 200 backstroke,” he said. “To be able to put up such a display consistently throughout this competition is likely a good indicator of how they will perform overall this season.”
Hanna opened the last day of the tournament with a win in the mile, and Cordes took first in the 200 back.
The Tigers’ road to success seemed well paved from the outset. Junior Megan Waters broke her own school record in the 50 free with a time of 22.87 after winning the 200-free relay along with Emily Trautner, Kathy Qu and Courtney Kilkuts in the opening event.
Junior Nicole McAndrew finished second in the 500 free behind Aemisegger, who set another pool record with a time of 4:38.54.
The women also placed second and third in the three-meter diving board event, while the men finished third and fourth. The men’s 200-free relay team finished first, just six-hundreths of a second ahead of LaSalle, and the Princeton men captured the top three spots in the 500 free thanks to Hanna, junior Patrick Biggs and sophomore Travis McNamara.
Day two featured big wins by Hanna in the 400 IM and Quemena in the 200 free. The 200-free relay team took second, while Christensen won the 100 breast in an impressive 55.14 before teaming with freshman Will Lawley, Quemena and senior Jon Hartmann to convincingly capture the 800-free relay.
Freshman Stevie Vines won the three-meter board competition for the divers. Aemisegger posted a fantastic time of 4:06.2 in the 400 IM, more than 17 seconds ahead of the rest of the field, and the 200 medley relay team of Waters, Kilkuts, Aemisegger and freshman Sarah Furgatch won handily.
All these victories at the Bucknell Invitational can only be a good sign for the Tigers. The women started the season with wins against Penn and Cornell. Their next set of league games starts in January with four consecutive meets against Dartmouth, Harvard, Yale and Columbia as a lead-up to the Ivy League Championships in late February. The men have a similar schedule and, having already secured wins against Penn and Cornell, appear primed to continue their winning ways in the Ivy League.
The rigors of the season won’t let up for a while, though.
“It is very unlikely that we will rest going these next two weeks before break,” Christensen said. “We will return back to Princeton early in order to get some hard training in preparation for the Harvard-Yale-Princeton ‘HYP’ duel at the end of Intersession.”
The upcoming string of meets will give the teams a good idea of where they stand in the league, and both squads will try to carry their impressive momentum to the Ivy League championships.
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