A three-day swim meet stood in front of the Bulls heading into the weekend, but both the UB men's and women's swimming and diving teams were up for the challenge.
The men and women swam to fourth and fifth places, respectively, at the Giant Eagle Zippy Invitational in Akron, Ohio last Friday through Sunday.
Over the course of the three-day meet, eight men's teams and 11 women's teams competed, with a few Mid-American Conference schools in the mix.
"A lot of the teams we faced this weekend we face in the MAC, such as Ball State," said senior Dustin Hui. "We still have a meet against St. Bonaventure who won the event. Basically, it's our level of competition."
Because of the teams' performances, both UB's men's and women's swimmers believe that they will carry this momentum into conference competition.
"I definitely think that (this showing) will help lead us into MAC play. We are still playing with our order and we have a lot of talent in our different events," said women's team member Frances Stephenson. "We are versatile so we are still deciding who will swim what events and we changed the order up a little bit and it worked."
Tulane won the women's side with 1,344.5 points, while St. Bonaventure narrowly defeated the Ball State men to take the title, 1,576 to 1,568.50 points.
Jennefer Brankovsky posted excellent results for the Bulls. After recently earning the MAC female Scholar Athlete of the Week award, the senior broke the meet and UB records in the 500-meter freestyle on Friday.
She followed her record-breaking performance on Friday by breaking two additional records. On Saturday, Brankovsky took the 100-meter breaststroke and on Sunday, she claimed the fastest time in the 200-meter butterfly.
Friday
The Bulls started off the day with disappointing finishes from both the men and women in the 200-meter freestyle.
Brankovsky would change the Bulls' luck by turning in a record-setting 4:57.97 in the 500-meter freestyle during the morning session of the meet. In the afternoon session, however, Brankovsky was edged out by Danielle Beland of Akron in the finals. Beland's slim victory in the 500-meter freestyle, in a time of 4.57.88, broke the previous record set by Brankovsky.
Despite the afternoon sessions showing better overall times by all of the participating teams, the victorious teams were the ones that capitalized on both sessions and posted solid marks in both the morning and the afternoon.
"As a team I think a lot of us need to swim faster in the mornings for when we go to ECAC and the MAC," said Hui. "This will allow us to make it back at night. Some of us didn't perform that well in the morning but did at night, myself included."
Buffalo's Jon Yarger cruised to a win in the 500-meter freestyle in a time of 4:41.37. Hui followed with a time of 4:55:80 to win his heat.
"I was really happy about winning the heat but overall my times were not really that great for this time in the season," said Hui.
Three UB swimmers made their way to the final of the men's 200-meter individual medley. Jeff Hurst earned fourth place in a time of 1:55:25, while Mark Sy and Erik Schwarz finished seventh and eighth, respectively.
On the women's side, a trio of sophomores plus Brankovsky teamed up to form the women's 400-meter medley relay team. Kahla Walkinshaw, Danielle Gervais, Stephenson and Brankovsky swam the Bulls to a fourth-place finish in the event. The relay team, only recently formed, exhibited a promising showing with a time of 3:57.15.
"We swam very well, our relay had a very good race. It was a race that shows a lot of promise for MAC teams," said Stephenson. "Even though it wasn't our best time, we raced hard. We finished well and our takeovers were very good."
In the 400-meter medley for the men, Schwarz, Sy, Hurst and Geoff Wells came together to take fifth place for the Bulls in a time of 3:30.43.
On the diving board for the men, Patrick Lee easily dominated the competition with a 452.05-point victory. Lee outscored his competition on the three-meter diving board by 20 points.
For the women, two UB divers placed in the one-meter competition. Ashlee Burton and Tracy Hoover earned scores of 207.85 and 205.35 to finish third and fourth.
Saturday
The teams headed back into the pool for day two of competition on Saturday. Even on a full night's rest, Hui understands that it is a challenge for anyone to swim at his or her peak performance twice in the same day.
"I think having to swim twice a day was the most difficult," Hui said. "We didn't have a lot of time between the morning and afternoon sessions. We were able to overcome that and still perform pretty well. Even given that circumstance, we still performed well against MAC teams, who we'll face during the season."
For the women, Stephenson finished in fifth place in the 400-meter individual medley for the Bulls.
A pair of fourth-place finishes in the 200-meter freestyle followed for the Bulls, with Walkinshaw finishing the race in a time of 1:54.99 and Yarger swimming to a 1:44.17 finish.
Brankovsky's record-setting weekend continued in the 100-meter breaststroke finals. She faced off against Tulane's Linda McEachrane, a swimmer who anchored Tulane's 800-meter freestyle relay team to a victory.
Both swimmers broke the previous meet record of 1:04.77, but McEachrane earned the decisive win, finishing the race in a time of 1:04.31 to beat Brankovsky's time of 1:04.63 by less than a second.
To close out day two of the meet, the Bulls earned two fourth-place finishes in the 800-meter freestyle relays. The men finished the race in a time of 7:00.71, while the women finished the relay in 7:42.28.
Sunday
The last day of competition ended with the Tulane women's team overcoming a 48.5-point deficit to earn the team title.
The Green Wave led with a 1-2-3 sweep in the women's 1650-meter freestyle. UB's Eugenie Viale finished 7th.
Another highlight of the final day included a rematch between Brankovsky and Beland that featured another record smashed. In the 200-meter butterfly, Beland came out on top to win the race in a meet record of 2:01.54. Brankovsky finished in a time of 2:03.02.
On the men's side, Sy finished the final individual, the 200-meter butterfly, in fourth place.
Both teams will get a break for the holiday season. The men will return to competition against Canisius on Jan. 9, and the women will head to Florida to participate in the Islamorada Invitational on Jan. 10.
