The men’s swimming and diving team finished comfortably at sixth place in the NESCAC championship meet last weekend. The finish was the Polar Bears’ best team score since 2012, and the meet was highlighted by the admirable performance of several swimmers and divers.
Michael Netto ’18 was named All-Conference in the 50-yard breaststroke, and diver Tommy Kramer ’15 was recognized as the Four Year High Point Diver.
The NESCAC championship took place at Middlebury College over three days.
Compared to other schools, the Polar Bears possessed considerable strength in the short races. According to Head Coach Brad Burnham,the Polar Bears did well all the way up to the 200m.
Netto stood out in his first appearance in a NESCAC championship meet.
He posted the highest individual finish of the weekend for the Polar Bears by taking second in the 50 breaststroke (25.64), sixth in the 100breaststroke (57.24) and seventh in the 50 butterfly (23.14). Logan House ’17 placed the seventh in the 50 butterfly (23.14). He also set the school record in the 100 butterfly last year.
“My butterfly was definitely not as strong as last year, but on the bright side my freestyle got a little bit faster,” said House. “Next year I’ll start over and make a better balance between strokes.”
Senior diver Kramer closes out his NESCAC career by achieving the best combined finish at the conference championships. He took fourth in the 3-meter dive (469.45) and fifth in the 1-meter diving competition (432.25).
Overall, the Polar Bears had a smooth run without major hiccups, unlike last year where the team bore a 48-point loss due to the disqualification of a relay team.
According to Coach Burnham, the major challenge is the exhaustion from such a long event.
Despite this fact, Bowdoin’s best relay of the weekend came on Sunday when the 400 free relay team of House, John Lagasse ’16, Will Hutchinson ’18 and William Shi ’15 placed fourth with a time of 3:06.02.
No major injuries were sustained during the championship, but two swimmers—Shi and Greg Koziol ’17—had just recovered from concussions.Shi hadn’t been in the pool for two weeks prior to the competition.
“When they went to rest, they were not quite in the same place as everybody else,” said Coach Burnham, “They had two weeks of no activity. [But] we were in the process of building up physical capacity. I don’t know what’s exactly going on physiologically. It’s definitely a different thing for them.”
Bowdoin and Bates have a long-time rivalry in swimming. Last year, the Polar Bears snatched the fifth spot over the Bobcats by a merehalf point, under the pressure of the unintentional 48-point loss. This year, Bates stands ahead of Bowdoin with 190 points.
“We have hopes, dreams and goals we would like to achieve. Sometimes the guys choose dependent goals, which means no matter what we do, we have to worry about other teams,” said Coach Burnham. “Bates has been our rival for years. We’ve been going back and forth with them for years in team totals. It’s always on the guys’ mind. That’s a kind of instinct of how we are doing. This year we fell behind Bates. They just have people who can swim faster and won more points.”
This weekend, Kramer will participate in the Northeast Regional Diving Championship in Springfield, MA. He is confident and looking forward to this meet.
“I feel weirdly calm about it. Again it’s just really practice. It’s no different from anything I’ve done any other day. I just went and did that meet this past weekend. And I’ll just have to do it again,” he said.