Several athletes earned all-conference honors as the DePauw men's swimming and diving team finished third in the North Coast Athletic Conference Championships in their first year in the new conference.
The Tigers won six straight conference championships in the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference, but placed third this year in the NCAC behind the top two ranked teams in the nation — Denison University and Kenyon College.
Despite the third place finish, the Tigers qualified multiple people for the NCAA Div. III National championship by reaching NCAA Div. III B cut times. B cut times are not a guaranteed spots into the national championship, though. The swimmers are now waiting for March 2nd, after the rest of the nation has competed and their times are either fast enough to qualify or not.
Freshman Casey Hooker and sophomore Matt Gleason both raced B cut time and earned all-NCAC honors with third place finishes — Hooker in the 500-yard freestyle (4:31.49) and Gleason 200-yard individual medley (1:52.92) and 200-yard butterfly (1:51.53). All three times were school records for DePauw.
Hooker also earned a B cut time in the 1,650-yard freestyle with a sixth place finish.
For sophomore George Morrison, the conference championships went very well despite their third place finish.
"Conference went great," Morrison said. "We had at least one guy in every top heat and qualified quite a few guys for nationals which was nice."
All five of the Tigers relay teams finished in third place, with three of those teams reaching B cut times. The 200-yard freestyle relay team of freshman Matt Bacinich, senior John Montgomery, sophomore Jack Burgeson and freshman Alex Alfonso (1:22.94), the 400 medley relay of Hooker, junior Matt Kukurugya, Gleason and Montgomery (3:22.15) and the 400 free relay team of Hooker, Alfonso, Burgeson and Montgomery (3:03.95) will now have a chance to make the national championships in Indianapolis.
The Tigers knew entering the meet that competition would be raised in the NCAC, but for the team it was just another hurdle on their way to success.
"We knew from the very beginning that it would be tough, but we wanted to really try to fight hard and take it to another level," Morrison said. "We went in there and swam great and had a lot of great times which will bring some of the guys on the team to nationals."
Other members of the team to earn B cut times were Montgomery in the 50 free with a sixth place finish (20.90), freshman Jordan Bantista in the 1650 free with another sixth place finish (16:03.34) and Kukurugya with a fourth place finish in the 200 breast stroke (2:07.62).
The Tigers had high expectations going into their first ever NCAC conference championship, but understand a third place finish is respectable and another step towards becoming a national power.
"Throughout the season we beat a higher ranked team in Chicago and more than doubled Wabash's scores," Morrison said. "So this is another step towards nationals."
The Tigers must hold tight to learn their fate for the national championships on March 21. The championships are held at IUPUI's natatorium.
