Athlete of the Week: Seniors Lead Men's Swimming and Diving to HYP Victory

The class of 2015 is going out with a splash.

The Harvard men’s swim and dive team (9-0, 7-0 Ivy) finished off the dual meet season with a sweep of Yale (7-2, 4-2) and Princeton (7-3, 5-1) in the annual HYP meet this weekend, winning eleven total events across two days of competition for its third consecutive HYP sweep. With the wins, the Crimson earned the overall dual meet title by going undefeated this regular season.

Harvard defeated the Bulldogs by a score of 271-82 and the Tigers by a score of 190-163.

Coming into the meet, the Crimson was expecting its toughest competition of the year, as both Yale and Princeton were also undefeated in Ivy competition going into Saturday’s races.

“Our energy was unmatched,” co-captain Mike Gaudiani said. “We had some incredible swims out of our guys for this meet.”

Though the meet was a team effort, the seniors shone in their final meet at Blodgett Pool as they celebrated senior day. Since they joined the team as freshman, this group of swimmers has not lost an HYP meet since their freshman season, sweeping both the Bulldogs and the Tigers each of the last three years.

Harvard got off to a strong start on the first day of competition, touching the wall first in six of 10 events to put itself in the lead and giving a strong base to repeat as HYP champions for the fourth consecutive year. After 10 events, the Crimson led Yale by a score of 142-44 and the Tigers, 102-84.

The surprise race of the meet came on the first day of competition in the 400-yard medley relay, when Harvard B relay of freshman Koya Osada, sophomore Eric Ronda, sophomore Max Yakubovich, and senior Spenser Goodman beat out both Princeton and the Crimson’s A relay squads to touch the wall first with a time of 3 minutes, 14.60 seconds. The group was just over a half-second shy of an HYP meet record, especially thanks to Goodman’s strong finish as the anchor with a 20.71 split.

“The one swim that stood out the most was the 400 medley relay B team,” senior Griffin Schumacher said. “No one really thought they would win the event…. [Goodman] split his best 100 freestyle time to chase down the Princeton team and give us a victory.”

Both Schumacher and Goodman anchored several relays that each placed to add to the Crimson’s point totals.

One senior who has been a consistent powerhouse for Harvard is diver Mike Mosca, who took the top spot in both diving events, with a score of 332.10 in the 1-meter and 420.05 in the 3-meter event. The Crimson men were able to sweep the top three spots in the 3-meter, with freshmen Bobby Ross and David Pfeifer taking second and third, respectively.

Depth was a key to success for Harvard, as it often had multiple swimmers in the top three of events, even when they were beat out by a Yale or Princeton swimmer. As the competition with the Crimson and the Tigers were only separated by 27 points after two days of racing, those finishes were equally as important as the races the team won.

On the second day of competition alone, Harvard had four events in which it claimed the top two podium spots. After losing two consecutive events to the Tigers, sophomore Jack Manchester and Osada regained momentum by taking first and second in the 200 back. A 1-2-3 sweep of the 100 fly by Yakubovich, freshman Steven Tan, and sophomore Jacob Luna regained Crimson momentum as they neared victory.

Harvard swims again when it heads to Princeton for the Ivy League Championship meet on February 26. The Crimson is looking to defend its Ancient Eight title.

“We celebrate today, celebrate our seniors, but we can’t rest on our laurels,” Gaudiani said. “Princeton is an incredibly fast team and they competed lights out this meet. We are going to keep training for the last month before Ivies.”

—Staff writer Theresa C. Hebert can be reached at thebert@college.harvard.edu.