M. Swimming Rolls Over Cornell

The Harvard men's swimming team swept nine of 16 events and finished first in 15 of them on its way to a 224-70 romp over Cornell over the weekend.

Senior Ed Wagner keyed the Crimson's domination by becoming the fastest swimmer in Harvard history, breaking the school record in the 50-yard freestyle with a time of 20.37.

Many swimmers were competing for spots for the upcoming Easterns swimming meet and shaved in order to try and get the best times possible.

The strategy paid off for junior Dave Bandy, who won both the 200 and 500 freestyles with times of 1:40.34 and 4:32.87 respectively.

"The main reason I won those events was because I was shaved," Bandy said. "Cornell also just doesn't have the talent that we do and I was really going for good times in order to get into the Easterns."

Harvard showed its tremendous team depth with strong performances in all the events. The only Cornell victory was in the 200 backstroke--by one hundredth of a second.

In addition to Wagner's record setting performance in the 50 freestyle, three freshmen--Mike Chen, Jon Kossow and Laurent Alfred--turned in lifetime best times to finish second and tied for third, respectively.

Junior Richard Ou, who was still unshaved, won the 100-yard breaststroke with a 57.97 performance.

Sophomore Ilan Rzadkowolsky-Roali crushed his nearest rival in the 400 individual medley by nearly three seconds with a time of 4:04.41. He also swam an exhibition race in the 200 breaststroke and wound up defeating the actual winner by over seven seconds with a time of 2:07.76.

"We basically had a lot more talent than Cornell and we were a lot deeper," senior Ed Owens said. "Cornell is also not a great team and they've been having morale problems lately. We're also at the point of the season where we're rested and shaved and we've started to peak."

Not to be outdone, the men's diving team took five out of the top six spots in the one and three meter diving competition, with junior Craig Narveson winning both events. Narveson had scores of 315.30 and 313.58 in the one and three meters boards respectively, and blasted his nearest competitors by an average of 40 points.

The swim team faces Penn this weekend in their final meet before the Easterns. Penn is also expected to pose little threat to the Crimson.

"Barring major disaster, we ought to be able to take care of Penn," Owens said. "Our main test will be at Easterns."