ALFRED, NY — The Alfred University men's swimming & diving team continued its winning ways, defeating the Hobart Statesmen 214-77 on Friday night.
"We keep moving in the right direction. We had another great week of solid work in the pool and it showed this evening," Head Coach Brian Striker said. "We keep making improvements, not just in the competitive setting, but in practices and with how we handle ourselves throughout each day as a student-athlete. There is a little fatigue setting in as we are halfway through this stretch of Fall semester meets, but we are in a great place and I continue to be pleased with how well they are doing all things considered."
AU (2-1, 1-0 Empire 8) brought home 14 wins, starting off on the right foot in the 200-yard medley relay with a team of Rihards Kagis (Kekava, Latvia/British School Muscat), Carlos Gonzalez (Baja California, Mexico/Unifront), Mahmoud Elkady (Cairo, Egypt/Smart City) and Emmanuel Drappatz (Pittsburgh, PA/Fox Chapel Area) coming in at 1:38.87.
Kagis also got the win in the 50-back (25.24) and 100-back (54.05). Gonzalez backed up his performance as the Empire 8 Swimmer of the Week in the 100 and 50-fly with respective times of 53.77 and 24.25.
Elkady secured wins in the 50-breaststroke and 100-yard breaststroke, clocking in at 26.99 and 1:00.38 respectively. Finally, the anchor of the medley relay team in Drappatz got his own individual win in the 50-yard freestyle with a 22.81.
Other victors included Alex Vail (Lake Oswego, OR/Lakeridge) in the 1000-yard freestyle (10:41.07) and in the 100-yard IM (58.82). Calem Striker (Hornell, NY/Hornell) was on the top step in the 200-free at 1:49.20 and the 100-free at 48.42. In addition, he was part of the 200-free relay-winning team with the aforementioned Drappatz and Gonzalez, along with Sean Killian (Kenmore, NY/St. Joseph's Collegiate Institution) clocking in at 1:30.83.
The final victors of the evening were Diego Monroy (Mexico City, Mexico/Colegio Simon Bolivar) in the 500-freestyle in lane five, with a time of 5:14.43. Finally, Jaxson McQuaid (Norwalk, CT/Norwalk) swept both diving events, with winning scores of 200.40 and 216.38 in the 3-meter and 1-meter dives, respectively.
Alfred University will look to win two more times in the next meet, hosting a tri-meet against Fredonia and the University of Rochester. The meet will get underway on Saturday, November 7 at 11:00 a.m.
— Swords Forward Saxons —
