Lynch Wins One-Meter Diving Title at ECAC Championships

UB men's swimmers and divers finish eighth among 19 scoring teams

Cassidy Lynch

PITTSBURGH, PA - For the second time in three days, the University at Buffalo's Cassidy Lynch (Westminster, CO/Legacy) captured a diving title as the Bulls concluded the ECAC Championships at the University of Pittsburgh's Trees Pool on Sunday. The Bulls finished the three-day meet with 183 points to place eighth among 19 scoring teams in the overall standings. Johns Hopkins won the team title with 541 points.

Lynch posted a six-dive total of 284.00 points to capture the one-meter diving crown on Sunday. He entered the final round after posting the highest point total (286.75) in the preliminaries earlier in the day. It was the freshman's second diving victory of the meet. Lynch won the three-meter title on Friday night with a school-record 333.40 six-dive total. Lynch also earned the ECAC Diver of the Year award.

UB's 400-yard freestyle relay squad reached the championship race of its event. The Bulls turned in the fifth-best qualifying time of the preliminaries at 3:11.93 and actually improved on that mark in the finals but finished lower in the championship race. The UB foursome of Luke Adams (Quinnesec, MI/Kingsford), Kevin Schuster (Rochester, NY/Greece Athena), Kevin Gatley (Charlton, NY/Burnt Hills-Ballston Spa) and Jeff Hurst (Rochester, NY/Greece Athena) was seventh in the finals in 3:10.16.

Two Bulls also competed in Sunday's individual consolation races. Adams posted a season-best time of 1:53.75 in the 200-yard backstroke. Adams finished 13th overall, fifth in the consolation final, in 1:55.70. Aaron Moessinger (Elma, NY/Iroquois) competed in the 200-yard butterfly consolation finals. Moessinger turned in a lifetime-best time of 1:56.86 in the opening heats on Sunday. He finished 16th overall, 1:57.30 in the consolation final. Mike Hurst (Rochester, NY/Greece Athena) just missed reaching the consolation round of the 200-yard butterfly, earning the first alternate spot, with his 17th-place preliminary finish of 1:57.70.

The Bulls returned to the top 10 of the ECAC standings after finishing 12th at last season's meet in Pittsburgh. The Bulls have reached the top 10 in nine of the last 10 years.

Head coach Budd Termin was pleased with his team's results over the three-day meet. "The goal is to come down and either swim right at or surpass our lifetime bests and we did both of those," he said. "It's a perfect tuneup for us because the competition is every bit as strong as in the MAC Championships. Everyone really stepped up and competed well. We're in a good position to try and improve on every time we did this week."

The Bulls will get the chance to take on their MAC brethren next weekend when the league championships take place in Athens, OH.

02/26/2006