Jan. 16, 2010
NOTRE DAME, Ind. – Despite sweeping the 1- and 3-meter diving events on top of a pair of John Lytle individual wins, the Notre Dame men’s swimming and diving team dropped a highly competitive 166-134 decision to No. 16 Louisville Saturday at the Rolfs Aquatic Center. Wesley Villaflor (1-meter) and Nathan Geary (3-meter) were each victorious off the boards while Lytle touched the wall first in the 200 and 100 free. Petar Petrovic added a win in the 200 back.
Notre Dame’s dual meet record evened to 4-4 overall and 1-1 against BIG EAST opponents. The Irish will next be in action Jan. 29-30 when the team hosts the Shamrock Invitational.
“What we did today is what we want to do in every meet,” Irish head coach Tim Welsh said. “Not in terms of wins or losses, but we raced with spirit, heart and commitment. We were much faster than last week. This was our fastest non-championship meet of the year. And it’s a giant step from where we were last night against Michigan State, and I’m very proud of how our men rebounded. Congratulations to Louisville on a hard-fought win.”
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200 Medley Relay: Louisville’s Brendon Andrews took a slight lead on the back over Petrovic … Chris Johnson was unable to pull any closer on the breast … Carlos Van Isschot placed even more distance between the Cardinals and the Irish on the fly leg … Lytle was unable to overcome a blistering 19.87 split laid down by Kris Findorff … the Irish took second (1:31.95) to the Cardinals (1:29.88).
1,000 Freestyle: Michael Sullivan flipped at the 200-yard mark with body length lead on the field … at the halfway mark, his lead had eroded slightly, keeping a one-second lead in front of the nearest Louisville challenger … Louisville’s Shane Lichtenburg pulled even at the 750-yard mark … with 100 yards to go, Sullivan faded to third and gallantly tried to hold off yet another Louisville swimmer … his efforts came up short as he took fourth (9:34.42) behind first-place finisher Lichtenburg (9:26.03)
200 Freestyle: Andrews used a good start to jump to the early lead … but Lytle caught up before the second flip and continued to press forward … Andrew Hoffman also regained the early lost ground … by the 150-yard mark, both Hoffman and Lytle enjoyed a full-body length lead and the duo did not let up on gas pedal … it then turned into a race between the teammates to see who would emerge golden from the water … Lytle used a strong final split of 25.27 to surpass Hoffman and take first with a 1:40.01 over Hoffman’s 1:40.31.
100 Backstroke: Van Isschot established a lead early on off of his underwater breakout and forced Petrovic to play catch-up … by the halfway mark, Van Isschot continued to pull away and Petrovic began fighting off a Louisville swimmer for second-place honors … Petrovic drove to the wall and secured the second-place medal (50.32) behind Van Isschot’s first-place time of 49.10.
100 Breaststroke: Johnson was neck-and-neck with Carlos Almeida going into the final lap of the sprint breaststroke discipline … Almeida surged forward with an impressive backhalf split of 29.35 to take the top of the podium with a 55.66 … Johnson was relegated to runner-up position with a 57.02, edging out the third-place finisher from Louisville by one tenth of a second.
200 Butterfly: A three-way race emerged for first emerged after the first leg of the distance fly event … MacKenzie LeBlanc and Bill Bass dueled it out with Rafal Kuchta and the race stayed tight through the final touch … Kuchta (1:50.01) looked like he had pulled away on the final turn but LeBlanc surged in a final effort but came up seventh hundredths of a second short on the final touch (1:50.08).
50 Freestyle: Findorff darted to an early lead in the splash and dash and didn’t look back (20.35) … David Anderson (21.33), Kevin Overholt (21.37) and Thomas Van Volkenburg (21.47) rallied to take second through fourth to secure some much-needed points for the Irish.
1-meter diving: Villaflor took top honors in the event, taking top position in the field with a score of 308.78 … Geary finished second with a score of 281.99.
100 Freestyle: Andrews again took an early lead off of the start but Lytle was in hot pursuit … after turning nearly even at the 50-yard mark, Lytle lowered his head and sliced to the wall with the race hanging on the touch … Lytle powered home to emphatically grab his second victory of the day (45.09) over the challenger Andrews (45.17).
200 Backstroke: Petrovic used his underwater kicks well, establishing a solid body-length lead over his nearest competitor, which happened to be Sullivan … Petrovic (1:50.84) cruised to his first-place spoils and Sullivan maintained his second-place position comfortably (1:52.08) … Christopher Wills (1:53.70) was involved in a duel for third, but came up short on the touch and just missed out on a potential 1-2-3 sweep for the Irish.
200 Breaststroke: Almeida lead from the first pullout and never looked back … a late race for second developed as Joseph Raycroft began to surge on the last 50 yards … but the pool was too short for his comeback and Louisville took the 1-2 positions (2:02.66 and 2:07.58) … Raycroft was the highest Irish placer with a third-place turnout of 2:08.52.
500 Freestyle: Ryan Belecanech started off with some outside speed from lane one, leading the pack at the 100-yard mark … at the midway point Lichtenberg had pulled away from the field and led with a body-length advantage, but a five-way duel for second was heating up … with four lengths of the pool left, second place was solidly in the hands of Michael Pryor, and now the third-place position was up in contention between Bandy and LeBlanc … LeBlanc (4:41.38) held on for the final 25 yards to out-touch Bandy (4:41.41) by three hundredths of a second and pull in Notre Dame’s only medal in the event.
100 Butterfly: A three-way battle for gold developed after the initial 50 yards of the race … going into the final turn, Kuchta and Bass were nearly stroke for stroke, and they both gunned toward the finish pad … after lowering their heads and taking near simultaneous final strokes to the wall, Kuchta emerged victorious by the slimmest possible margin, literally finishing first by a fingernail as he touched in at 50.22 over Bass’ 50.23.
3-meter Diving: Geary took top honors for the 3-meter springboard with a score of 337.65 … Villaflor took third with a score of 290.92.
200 Individual Medley: Almeida and Bass were neck-and-neck after the backstroke portion of the medley … but Almeida pulled ahead with his strong breaststroke leg … a late charge by Bass was not enough to close that gap, and Almeida took first with a time of 1:50.57 … Bass settled for second with a time of 1:51.66.
400 Freestyle Relay: Andrews again took an early lead as the leadoff swimmer but Lytle closed the gap to nearly create a tie after the first leg’s completion … Findorff blasted off a 43.82 split on the second leg to create what would prove to be an insurmountable lead for the race … Louisville won the race in the gold medal time of 2:59.94 with Notre Dame finishing out the meet with another silver, touching the wall with a time of 3:01.81.
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