Tigers use final relay to defeat Leopards

LOS ANGELES, Calif. (Jan. 9, 2010) – Entering the swim meet this morning at Taylor Pool, the Occidental College men’s squad trailed by 26 points since they have no divers. The Tigers were not discouraged in the friendly confines of their home pool, though, posting seven first place finishes in nine individual events while sweeping the relays en route to a 117-107 win.

The most exciting swims of the meet came in the first and final races of the day. To open up the swimming portion of the meet Stephen Ratkovich, Jeven Dovey, Miner Ross and Adam Kantor joined forces to win the 200 Medley Relay by three tenths of a second in 1:43.69. Closing out the meet with just as exciting of a race was Riley Kimball, Will Carlson, Austen Oliver and Zach Condon who combined to swim the 200 yard free relay in a time of 1:33.34, merely out touching the Leopards’ team by 26 hundredths of a second to clinch the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference meet win.

Condon was victorious in his two individual events, the 1650 free, which he won by more than 14 seconds in a time of 18:24.03, and the 200 backstroke, which he completed in 2:14.53, again winning by nearly 10 seconds. Joining the sophomore with a pair of victories was Kantor who won both the 50 free (22.50) and the 100 butterfly (56.19).

Ross and Ratkovich went 1-2 in the 100 free finishing hundredths of seconds apart at 50.66 and 50.83. Ross placed third in the 50 free while Ratkovich came in second in the 200 free (1:56.51) ahead of Oliver who completed the swim in 1:57.40. Carlson rounded out the scoring in the event, touching the wall in 2:02.97.

Carlson also scored for the Tigers in the 200 back, along with Alex Budig as they swam the race in 2:31.79 and 2:42.12, respectively.

Also earning first place accolades today was Dovey who swam in one of the meet’s closest races in the 200 breaststroke. He glided into the wall at 2:20.13 with ULV’s Scott Jones on his heels at 2:20.80. Richard Dybas earned fourth place finishes in the event (2:49.04) as well as in the1650 (20:52.53) and 500 free (6:06.44), which Oliver won in a time of 5:19.96.

Dovey was second in the 400 individual medley, in another close race. His time of 4:37.88 was 73 hundredths of a second behind the winner, Mark Wilson, of La Verne. Kimball posted a fourth place finish in the event (5:03.22) and also came in fourth in the 100 fly with a time of 1:01.05.

Occidental will jump back into the pool on Monday, Jan. 11 when they host the Pioneers from Lewis & Clark College in a non-conference meet beginning at 2:00 p.m.