Pawel Werner, Sebastien Rousseau, Eduardo Solaeche-Gomez and Marcin Cieslak put Florida within range of the Southeastern Conference championship on Tuesday in College Station, Texas.
The group registered a 6:14.76 in the 800-meter free relay and finished 6 seconds ahead of second-place Tennessee for Florida’s first outright win of the tournament.
The Gators’ time tops their previous season-high mark of 6:21.84 set during the Ohio State Buckeye Invitational in Columbus, Ohio, on Dec. 1.
The time is the third-best in school history.
At the close of the first day of competition, the fourth-ranked Florida men’s team sits in third place with 149 points. The fifth-ranked women’s team ranks seventh with 126 points after the first day of competition.
Florida placed in the top three of all four team relay events.
The team of Christian Homer, Matt Elliot, Cieslak and Brad deBorde placed third in the 200 medley relay.
The combination earned Florida’s second overall NCAA “A” time, finishing in 1:25.64.
In the other pool, the Gators women’s team placed second in both the 200 medley and 800 freestyle relays.
Sinead Russell, Hilda Luthersdottir, Ellese Zalewski and Natalie Hinds matched Florida’s season-best in the 200 medley with a time of 1:35:96.
The Gators closed the evening with a season-best 6:56.63 on the 800 freestyle relay. Zalewski, Russell, Beisel and Bohunicky topped UF’s season-best mark of 7:04.58.
Despite the early success, Florida faces an uphill climb with SEC rival Auburn ahead in the standings.
The Auburn men’s team holds a 40-point lead against second-place LSU. Florida ranks third, trailing by a total of 47 points.
On the women’s side, UF trails first-place Tennessee by 59 points heading into the second day of competition.
The Tigers have edged the Gators in the last three seasons on the men’s side at the SEC Championships by narrow margins.
In 2012, Auburn topped Florida by 30.5 points.
UF will participate in preliminaries for the 500 freestyle, 200 individual medley, 50 freestyle and women’s one-meter diving today.
