COLLEGEVILLE, Minn. – Saint John’s won 12 of the 16 events in a 157-143 victory over Carleton on Saturday, Jan. 24, in the Warner Palaestra Pool.
The Johnnies registered 20 top-three performances. Three seniors posted a total of seven individual wins, while SJU swept the diving competition against Carleton’s All-American diving squad.
Senior Brayden Slavik (Green Isle, Minn./Chaska) won three events, including a pool-record time of 16:10.20 in the 1,650-yard freestyle. The previous pool record was 16:23.13 set by St. Olaf’s Ryan Palmer in 2000.
The reigning MIAC Men’s Swimming Athlete of the Week was also first in the 200-yard backstroke (1:56.32) and 200-yard individual medley (1:57.65), collecting three individual event wins for the second week in a row.
Slavik was also the final leg of the Johnnies’ first-place, 200-yard freestyle relay (Reuter, Hovda, Schulze, Slavik) in 1:26.91. The 200-yard medley relay (Roggeman, Megaw, Reuter, Schulze) was second (1:39.38).
Senior Carsten Reuter (St. Cloud, Minn./Tech) dominated the short sprints, finishing first in the 50- (21.92) and 100-yard (48.90) freestyles.
Senior Clay Megaw (Monticello, Minn.) joined his classmates with a pair of wins on Senior Day, sweeping the breaststroke events with times of 59.69 seconds (100-yard) and 2:12.90 (200-yard).
Junior Cody Watts (St. Cloud, Minn./Tech) topped the reigning MIAC Men’s Diving Athlete of the Week and last season’s MIAC Diver of the Year, the Knights’ Hans Anderson, to win the 1- (273.70) and 3-meter (238.65) dives. Sophomore Henry Hilgendorf (Owatonna, Minn.) was third on the 1-meter board (201.90), while senior Tim Rotter (Blaine, Minn.) took third in the 3-meter dive (191.70).
Freshman Vincent Schulze (Eden Prairie, Minn.) added another victory for the home team, touching the wall first in the 200-yard freestyle (1:47.91) and second, 0.26 of a second behind his first-place teammate Reuter, in the 100-yard version of the same stroke.
Junior Trevor Barton (Buffalo, Minn.) claimed first in the 500-yard freestyle (4:57.57) and took second in the 200-yard freestyle (1:49.31).
Freshman Braydon Ohrtman (Highlands Ranch, Colo.) followed Barton in the 500-yard freestyle (5:01.97) for second. Sophomore Jason Jones (Monticello, Minn.) and freshman Lincoln Cochran (Helena, Mont./Capital) added a pair of third-place finishes, with Jones finishing the 100-yard breaststroke in 1:02.60 and Cochran the 200-yard individual medley in 2:06.70.
The Johnnies return to the pool in two weeks with two events. SJU competes at the two-day First Chance Meet hosted by Division I Minnesota on Friday-Saturday, Feb. 6-7, at the Jean Freeman Aquatic Center in Minneapolis, while the divers travel further south for the Dodd Road Diving Invitational on Feb. 7 at Carleton in Northfield.
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