Other than the relay events, collegiate swimming and diving doesn1t appear to be much of a team sport on the surface.
But GW swimming and diving head coach Dan Rhinehart said that1s what the GW men1s swimming team gave in a 128-114 victory over the U.S. Naval Academy Saturday at the Smith Center. The win avenged a 126.5-114.5 loss to Navy last season.
3We had to move some people around, and they basically had to do it for the team,? Rhinehart said. 3That1s what1s more important about this win – not so much that we actually won, but we did it with a real team effort.?
Rhinehart noted that sophomore Wes Teter and junior Tim Champney had to swim in events in which they don1t usually compete. Champney won both the 100-yard freestyle and the 200-yard freestyle easily, even though his specialty is the backstroke. Rhinehart said Champney is ranked 12th nationally in the 100-yard backstroke and 14th in the 200-yard backstroke.
GW swimmers placed first in all but three of the 13 events. GW jumped out to an early lead with a victory in the 400-yard medley relay and never looked back.
Champney and senior Rich DeWet led the Colonials with two wins. DeWet took the 50-yard freestyle by a hundredth of a second and won the 200-yard butterfly by three seconds over teammate David Simonetti.
3We1ve been training really hard up until this point in the season, and we haven1t raced it at all,? DeWet said. 3It1s a really good way to start the season.?
Teter won the 1,000-yard freestyle by about 10 seconds over the closest Navy swimmer. Other winners for GW included junior Juan Bocanegra (200-yard individual medley), junior Nick Hopman (200-yard backstroke) and sophomore Mike Cottone (200-yard breaststroke).
The Colonials also won the 400-yard freestyle relay by three seconds over Navy1s second-place team.
GW1s weak link in the meet was in the one-meter and three-meter diving events. With only one diver on the squad – Jeremy Hoders – GW was at a disadvantage as Navy had four divers in the competition. Because the top four divers score in every event, Navy was guaranteed to have three scorers in each event.
Hoders took third in the one-meter and second in the three-meter. Rhinehart said his team is going to need solid performances from Hoders throughout the season.
3We1re putting a lot of pressure on Jeremy, no doubt about it,? Rhinehart said. 3We can1t dwell on what we don1t have, we have to go with our strengths and hope it1s going to be enough.?
Both the men1s and women1s swimming and diving teams are back in action Saturday when they take on Duquesne and the College of William & Mary at the Smith Center. Diving starts at 11 a.m. and the swimming competition begins at 1 p.m.
