The third annual Texas/Indiana tri-meet at the O’Connell Center concluded after Day 2, and while the men’s swimming team did manage to escape with a victory over three-time defending champions Texas, there was not a whole lot of success anywhere else.
As far as total wins go, the Gators had one less today than they did on Day 1, emerging victorious in two events. Senior standout Caeleb Dressel posted the fastest time of the men’s 50 freestyle event with a time of 19.61, and Polish native Jan Switkowski took first in the men’s 200 butterfly with a time of 1:45.24.
The women’s team were defeated by both Texas and Indiana in the tri-meet. Despite this, sophomore Kelly Fertel found the positives in the team’s performance.
“I think we did a really good job today, just getting up and racing,” she said. “We’ll just need to listen to our corrections and fix the little things. I think it’s always good to compete against bigger teams, because it’s a better opportunity to see what we can do.”
Assistant coach Leah Stancil praised both the men’s and women’s teams for swimming tough and aggressive but asserted that there was still much improvement left to be done.
“Right now, we have a few things we need to continue to work on,” she said. “We need to work on our turns, our kicks off the wall, our breakouts. It's always helpful with swim meets to take it all back to training and see the little things we can work on.”
The Gators men’s team defeated Texas 258-171, but lost to Indiana 242-187. The women’s team were defeated by both Texas and Indiana, losing to the Longhorns 290-136 and the Hoosiers 251-178.
The Indiana Hoosiers continued their roll after Day 1, winning every team event and emerging victorious in eight other events. In addition to defeating both Florida teams, they also defeated the Longhorns men’s team 264-165; however, their women’s team fell in a close loss the Texas, 226.5-200.5.
The Gators are heading for a busy week, going to Tuscaloosa to face Alabama on Oct. 25 and then hosting Georgia back in Gainesville on Oct. 27.
“This is a big week for us,” said senior Ben Manganiello. “We have three competitions with top ten teams, and if we can go and compete tough, it’ll really set us up for the rest of the year.”
You can follow River Wells on Twitter @riverhwells, and contact him at rwells@alligator.org.
Caeleb Dressel races in the 400 meter freestyle relay during Florida’s meet against Auburn on Jan. 23, 2016, in the O’Connell Center.
