The men’s swimming team faced many challenges while hosting the NESCAC championship last weekend but at the end of a tough three days, Bowdoin came out with a best-ever fifth-place finish, setting half a dozen school records in the process.

Ryan Kulesza ’15 set new school marks in the 200 IM, the 400 IM, and his 200 leg of the 800 free relay, which as a relay broke the school record that had been in place since 1992. Tim Long ’17 broke a pair of 20-year-old records in the 500 and 100 freestyles, and Logan House ’17 set a new school mark in the 100 butterfly.

While the top few teams jumped out to early leads and held on, Greason Pool was the scene of a tense battle between the Polar Bears and the Bates Bobcats for the middle-of-the-pack finishes. After the first day of swimming, the hosts were in sixth place with 321.5 points, some 27.5 points behind Bates and over 300 behind leader and eventual champion Williams. Even after the second day came to a close, Bowdoin still trailed its fierce rival by nearly 70 points.

But when the third and final day came to an end, Bowdoin finished with 777.5 points, in fifth and a mere half-point over Bates. It was easily the closest finish in the contest, with the next closest being a 11.5-point margin of Colby over Wesleyan.

The Bowdoin-Bates battle went back and forth over the course of three days, with the hosts nearly jumping to a significant lead early Saturday night. However, a relay team was disqualified due to a false start when one Bowdoin racer left .07 seconds before his teammate touched the wall.

Though it took the electronic timing system to confirm, the coaching staff knew immediately the team would be in trouble. Even though the relay team performed well, the 48 points it would have earned for Bowdoin were never counted. It was a huge point swing, letting Bates maintain its lead into day three.

 “A lot of teams might have just written it off and felt like they were going to get sixth, but the guys just did a great job fighting back and scoring every point they could,” said Head Coach Brad Burnham. “That night was one of the best sessions they ever had. They woke up Sunday morning tired but got themselves back into finals in a lot of great scoring positions.”

In the end, the race came down the final relay, with Bowdoin placing just high enough relative to Bates to snatch the fifth spot from the Bobcats. As Burnham was happy to point out, “We somehow found a way to claw back up so relays could finish it off.”

“We set a new school record in the 800 meter free relay and we wouldn’t have done that unless we were right next to Bates,” added Burnham.

Burnham capped off his 13th year as head coach with his second fifth-place NESCAC finish—the best in school history—in three years. But he said he still wants more.

“Even when you beat another team, or swim some fast times, you can always think of places to improve, and after the results its just about getting on to those things,” advised Burnham.
Senior distance swimmer Alex Tougas was delighted with the team’s performance and the way they came together to overcome Bates.

“It was amazing to have beaten Bates by a half point and to have done well individually,” he said.  “As a senior, I could not have asked for a better culmination to my swimming career. This team was an awesome group of guys. They are great swimmers and lifelong friends."