Men's Swimming & Diving Defeated by Cornell, 177-123

Friday, January 26

Ithaca, NY

Brown University

Cornell

Men's Swimming & Diving Defeated by Cornell, 177-123

1/27/2018 12:00:00 AM | Men's Swimming & Diving

ITHACA, N.Y. – The Brown men's swimming & diving team was defeated by Cornell, 177-123, at Teagle Pool on Saturday. Sophomore Cody Cline (Wellington, Fla.) highlighted the day's events by setting a pool record in the 100 freestyle with a first place finish.

"The men finished our 2017-2018 dual meet season in fashion, with multiple swimmers posting lifetime best times and the majority of our team swimming their fastest dual-meet times ever," said head coach Chris Ip. "This coaching staff has found that this year's team thrives off of momentum."

The diving events began on Friday upon the team's arrival in Ithaca. Freshman Ivan Ip (Rosemead, Calif.) led the Bears on the 1M board with a fourth place finish with a score of 253.27, just ahead of sophomore William McNelis (Grosse Pointe Woods, Mich.) (225.38). On the 3M, the two placed third (257.47) and fifth (247.88), again led by Ip.

To begin Saturday's portion of the meet, the Bears finished in second and third in the 200 medley relay. The highest finishing relay team consisted of sophomore Joon Sung (Los Angeles, Calif.), sophomore Alex Smilenov (Katy, Texas), junior William Steele (Katy, Texas), and Cline (1:30.59).

In the 1000 freestyle, freshman Riley Pestorius (Bridgewater, N.J.) swam to a lifetime best time of 9:23.35, winning the event by over eight seconds. Sophomore Troy Li (Carmel, Ind.) also scored in the event, taking fifth with a 9:47.49.

Freshman Michael Lincoln (Palo Alto, Calif.) was the sole Bear under the 1:40.00 mark in the 200 freestyle, taking second place with a 1:39.93. Junior Liam Hollowsky (Naples, Fla.) followed Lincoln's lead, taking fourth place in 1:41.24. Both times were the fastest dual meet efforts of the year for Lincoln and Hollowsky.

Sung took second in the 100 backstroke, with a lifetime best time of 49.19. Sophomore Coley Sullivan (Louisville, Ky.) took fourth in the event with a 50.01. These were also the fastest dual meet results of the season for Sung and Sullivan.

Sophomore Toshiki Takahashi (Tokyo, Japan) and freshman Max Pokutta (Palo Alto, Calif.) teamed up to take fourth and fifth in the 100 and 200 breaststrokes.

Juniors Matt Orringer (Ann Arbor, Mich.) and W. Steele swam to a fourth and fifth place finish in the 200 Butterfly. Orringer's result of 1:52.98 was his fastest dual-meet swim of the season.

The Bears dominated the sprint freestyle events, taking first and second in both the 50 and 100 freestyle. Cline (20.41 and 44.75) found the wall first in both of the sprints, and Smilenov (20.55 and 45.42) took second in both events. Sophomore Jagger Stephens (Agana Heights, Hagatna, Guam) also chipped in with a fifth place finish in the 100 freestyle (46.18).

Sullivan pulled away from the competition in the 200 backstroke to take the win with a 1:48.10, his best in-season time of the dual meet season. Junior Nicholas Brown (Sudbury, Mass.) stormed into the wall to take third in the event (1:50.23) and freshman Alex Park (Dix Hills, N.Y.) followed behind in fifth (1:53.09).

Lincoln (4:34.63) was out-touched in the 500 freestyle by less than a second, to place second overall. Pestorius (4:39.95) followed up his win in the 1000 freestyle with a fourth place finish in the event, and Hollowsky touched the wall in fifth with a 4:43.71.

The 100 butterfly was a strong event for the men as Sung won the event in a 49.01. W. Steele (49.23) and N. Brown (50.95) finished third and fifth respectively.

Park and Sullivan took second and fourth in the 200 IM to finish the individual events in the meet. Both Park's 1:52.07 and Sullivan's 1:53.64 were their fastest dual meet efforts of the season.

The meet ended on a very exciting note as Cline set a new pool record in the 100 freestyle (44.39) leading off the victorious 400-freestyle relay team of Cline, Sung, junior Charles Steele (Katy, Texas), and Smilenov. Their time of 2:59.99 was just .02 seconds off of the pool record in the event.

"We need to prep some of our men to be able to create this momentum earlier in the meet," said Ip. "After a sluggish start today, we came back strong and won four of the final seven events. I'm proud of our team for making that adjustment and congratulations to Cody Cline on his 100 freestyle pool record to lead off our final relay win."

The Bears next compete at the Ivy League Championships hosted by Princeton Wednesday, Feb. 21 through Saturday, Feb. 24.