Binghamton University swimming and diving head coach Sean Clark finally had a reason to crack a joke.
‘The lesson of the day: don’t get the coaches wet unnecessarily,’ he told his team in a post-meet talk on the bleachers of the Patricia A. Saunders Aquatic Center.
The mood was light because the BU men’s and women’s teams took home their first wins of the season Saturday afternoon with a dual-meet sweep of visiting Niagara. The women’s team won 174-118 and the men’s team won 160-131, ending the Bearcats’ fall semester on a high note.
‘Heading into the break we need to feel good about we what we’ve done to this point,’ Clark said. ‘I think my team feels good and I know I do.’
The BU women, led by freshmen Brittany Detlef and Kelsey Anderson, won 11 of 16 events.
Detlef won the women’s 100-yard and 200-yard butterfly with times of 1:00.28 and 2:13.70, respectively. She was also the third leg on the winning 200-yard medley relay team.
Anderson took both distance events, winning the 500-yard freestyle in 5:26.94 and the 1,000-yard freestyle in 11:02.65. BU senior Nicole Sweeney finished second in both events but was not scored in the 500-yard freestyle.
Lyndsi Worthington, Jordyn Kline, Nicole Sheridan and Allyce Brand also took home individual wins for the Bearcats.
‘Just up and down the whole team swam incredibly well,’ Clark said. ‘We had some nice depth and some nice front line swimmers.’
The men’s side also featured a strong team effort, with no Bearcat winning more than one individual event. Senior Bryan Kwiatkowski, juniors Brenno Varanda, Andrew Palumbo, Peter Rodrick and Brian Koralewski, sophomore Brian Jacobs and freshman Jason Chen each had a win.
Varanda, the reigning America East Swimmer of the Week, extended his team-leading individual win total to 13 with a top finish in the 200-yard backstroke in 1:59.45 ‘ over eight seconds ahead of Niagara’s Dan Killin.
‘We’ve been working hard all season, we all deserve a win, even though all the losses we had in the past were considered a win,’ Varanda said.
Clark and Varanda both said the Bearcats have been swimming well, despite losses in their previous four dual meets. The team is going through an adjustment period in the absence of David Holmes, Brian Koizim and Trevor Stone, who all graduated after last season.
‘There has been nothing wrong with us,’ Varanda said. ‘We had a huge senior class that was gone and just for that fact ‘ we have to put 110 percent, that extra 10 percent more into the water.’
Niagara was coming off a record-setting weekend at the Zippy Invitational, but the Purple Eagles had pool trouble this past week, limiting their practice time.
‘I don’t like to make excuses, we had some other things that went on this week with our pool,’ said Niagara head coach Ben Nigro.
Niagara senior Pat Garvey won the men’s 50-yard, 100-yard and 200-yard freestyle, and was on the winning 400-yard freestyle relay team.