Canton, OH. - After three days of swimming, the Wheeling University Men's Swimming team would enter day four of the Mountain East Conference (MEC) / Great Midwest Athletic Conference (GMAC) Championships with a chance to take the top spot in the MEC. The Cardinals would end up falling just short, scoring 835.5 points to finish fourth overall and second among their MEC competition. Three more All-MEC honorees headlined the day, as the Cardinals ended the four-day span combining for 12 All-MEC honors across the week.
Duygun would once again take on the distance events on day four, swimming in the evening session of the Men's 1650 Freestyle. He entered with a seed time of 16:33.86, the fourth lowest in the entire event, and was looking to climb above that in the championships. He would end up doing just that, cutting off just over nine seconds off that seed time, and getting into the top three of the event. He would finish third overall with a time of 16:24.51, taking third by just an arms length over Ashland's Jason Basile by .50 seconds. It capped off a big week for Duygun, who took home First Team All-MEC honors in the 1000 Free, 500 Free, and 1650 Free to sweep the distance events for the Cardinals.
The Cardinals would have two other swimmers compete in A Finals on the day, with one of those bringing home All-MEC honors. It would come in the 200-Yard Breaststroke, where Efe Kucuk and Archie Pigott each qualified for the A Final. It would be Pigott that would take home the All-MEC honor, finishing fourth in the field and just .05 seconds behind Davis & Elkins's Leonardo Oshiro for the top spot in the MEC. He would swim a time of 2:03.96 to earn Second Team All-MEC honors, earning his first All-MEC honor of the tournament. The final All-MEC award of the day would come in the relay, with the 400 Yard Freestyle Relay team of Nathaniel Oliveras, Quintin Tayali, Patrick Kirby, and Sarp Killic swimming. The foursome would earn Second Team All-MEC honors with a time of 3:08.40, with each of the Cardinal relay programs being recognized in the MEC.
The other A Final swimmer for the Cardinals was Kucuk, who joined Pigott in the 200 Breaststroke A Final. He would end up swimming a time of 2:13.39, finishing eighth in the field and fifth among the MEC competition in the field to round out the A finalists. In the morning session of the 1650 Freestyle, Nate Reigel would swim in the second heat and would put up enough to finish 12th overall with a time of 17:23.78, taking almost 20 seconds off of his seed time. In the sprint events, the Cardinals would spread three swimmers across two different finals of the 100-Yard Freestyle. Olivares and Aris Dimakis would swim in the B Final of the event, with Dimakis taking 13th, 47.16, and Olivares adding a 16th place finish at 47.62. Tayali would swim in the C Final, and ended up taking second in his heat, 18th overall, with a time of 47.65.
In the Men's 200-Yard Backstroke, the Cardinals would keep the success going with three swimmers in the B Final of the event, Meiko Schonekes would lead the crew, finishing 1th overall, third in the heat, with a time of 2:01.08, to pace the three Cardinals swimmers. Levi Parker would finish 14th with a time of 2:02.82, while Evan Yost rounded out the B Final with a time of 2:05.90. The final three Cardinal swimmers would follow Pigott and Kucuk in the 200 Breaststroke, with Matthew Charlesworth starting things in the B Final. He would manage to take 15th overall, swimming a time of 2:15.45, while Tom Currie rounded out the day in the C Final, taking 24th with a time of 2:25.15.
The Wheeling University Men's Swimming team now heads into the off-season as the young core looks to continue to grow on their success.
