Men's Swimming and Diving Rolls Through Brown, Penn

In the team’s second and final home meet of the season, Harvard men’s swimming and diving finished the day with a clean sweep in its dual meet against fellow Ivy league squads, Penn and Brown, at Blodgett Pool on Saturday.

Coming off a winter break training trip in Saint Croix, the Crimson (6-0, 5-0 Ivy) rode 11 first place finishes in the 16 events to claim victory in dominating fashion, resulting in 237-63 and 192-108 wins against the Bears (1-3, 0-3) and Quakers (7-2, 5-2), respectively.

Penn, whose only previous loss on the season came against Princeton, 217-234, posed a clear threat to hand Harvard its first defeat in Ancient Eight competition. But the Crimson, bolstered by the excitement generated from its seniors in their final meet at Blodgett, was able to hold off the Quakers, with its sprinters setting the tone early on.

“From the first event, the 200 medley relay, the sprinters got the ball rolling with a one-two finish,” said junior Aly Abdel Khalik. “The distance swimmers put up a good fight in the 1000 and from there we just had the momentum and everything went our way.”

The 200 medley relay team of sophomore Koya Osada, freshman Sebastian Lutz, junior Max Yakubovich, and junior Paul O’Hara claimed the early win with a time of 1:29.98, just ahead of the 1:30.23 mark of the second place Harvard squad. The two groupings traded the lead throughout, but O’Hara, the anchor, sprinted to the win in 19.48, the fastest time by a decent margin in the closing leg.

The relay contingent continued to roll after the early high in the medley. In the final race of the day, the 400 freestyle relay foursome swam to the top of the podium in 2:59.89, marking the first time the team has finished faster than three minutes in the event at this dual meet in the past two years.

“[Sophomore] Ed Kim, [sophomore] Steven Tan, Paul O'Hara and Sebastian Lutz went up against one of the best sprinters in the Ivy League and walked away with a few victories,” co-captain Christian Yeager said. “Their 400 freestyle relay was extremely impressive at this point in the season.”

O’Hara and Kim also had success earlier in the day in their individual races. After swimming to first and second place in the 50 freestyle, the duo only finished behind Quaker senior Eric Schultz’s time of 45.22 in 100 yard event with O'Hara’s claiming the silver. Kim’s 45.47 mark was good enough for third.

In the longer freestyle races, freshman Logan Houck doggedly chased Ivy League stalwart, Penn senior Chris Swanson, en route to second place finishes in both the 1000 and 500 free. Competing down to the wire in the longest race of meet, the rookie posted 9:10.38 in the 1000 yard event, which was merely 0.27 seconds slower than the Quaker. Freshman Brennan Novak went on to claim bronze in both events.

“Houck went head to head with … Swanson, who is arguably the best swimmer in the Ivy League… and almost beat him," Yeager said. “[Along with the 400 free relay, this event] really got our team excited and will show the league that we are ready to compete at the highest level.”

Fellow Crimson freshman, Daniel Tran, followed up his early success as part of the second place squad in the 200 medley relay with victories in both the 100 and 200 backstroke, along with claiming a silver medal in the 200 yard individual medley by racing to a 1:50.91 mark.

Coming in after Tran in the backstroke were Osada and junior Jack Manchester as the trio helped guide Harvard to placing the top-three finishers in the 100 and 200 yard races.

On the diving side, sophomore David Pfeifer capped off the day by pulling out victories in both the one-meter and three-meter springboard events. After winning the three-meter by 52.95 points with his 347.20 showing, the sophomore again paced the field in the one-meter by besting Harvard’s usual top finisher in the event, freshman Luke Martinez, by a mere 3.70 points.

—Staff writer Jackson Reynolds can be reached at jackson.reynolds@thecrimson.com