The Buffalo Bulls sent eight swimmers to this weekend's U.S. Open Swimming Championships held in Federal Way, Wash., and were able to swim away with two points, the first time in UB history a relay team scored points at the competition.
On top of that, there were some individual performances to complement the team effort.
Aviv Oren (UB record holder and 2003 MAC champion) took home 24th place out of 47 in the 100-meter breaststroke finals after qualifying for the event on Thursday.
The top 24 swimmers advanced to the finals and Oren placed 22nd in the preliminaries to give himself the opportunity with a time of 1:06.42, which was narrowly better than his finals time of 1:06.80. William Mrazek from Florida was the victor of the heat, finishing in 1:05.59.
The 400-meter relay race was where UB captured its two points. The team, comprised of Mark Sy, Oren, Kevin Gatley and Jon Yarger, placed 16th out of a possible 20 with a total time of 4:05.10. A Canadian team entrant won the event with a time of 3:42.16.
Sy, UB record holder in the 200-yard butterfly and 2004 Olympic hopeful, was banking on this past weekend to make the qualifying times to represent Canada. Sy turned in a 4:15.93 in the 400-meter medley, while teammate Alan Lowe put up a 4:15.30.
Other individual performances consisted of Yarger, who swam a 2:03.01 for the 200-meter freestyle, and Kevin Gatley and Geoff Wells completing the 100-meter butterfly in times of 1:00.76 and 1:07.26 respectively.
The meet was the final event for the team this semester.
Photo: Meredith Forrest Kulwicki
