The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
Georgia
Men's Swimming and Diving cruises to win over No. 9 Georgia
01.07.2012 | Men's Swimming and Diving
Jan. 7, 2012
AUSTIN, Texas - The No. 2 Texas Men's Swimming and Diving team dominated the dual meet against No. 9 Georgia on Saturday at the Lee & Joe Jamail Swim Center.
The final score was 160-125 but after the ninth event the Longhorns had a 147-41 lead to clinch the victory. For the remainder of the individual events, the Texas swimmers swam as an exhibition and were thus ineligible to score.
"It is almost like a little snow ball rolling down a snow hill," said Feigen. "It started with the Orange-White and we continue to gather momentum so hopefully by the end of the year we will be really strong when we get into March."
Prior to the meet, Texas honored its senior class before they swam in the final home meet of their career. The honorees included Neil Caskey, Matt Cooper, Jimmy Feigen, Eric Friedland, Matt Hoyland, Hayes Johnson, Drew Livingston, Kyle McNeilis and Jackson Wilcox. The seniors made the most of their big day.
"I have some really great memories here over the last four years," said Feigen. "I am happy we got to cap it off with a win and I am happy we are on such a great path for NCAA's. It was a good reflection meet and luckily we had enough time today to do that."
Feigen, Caskey and Friedland were all on the winning 200 medley relay team. Feigen also took first in the 50 freestyle, 100 freestyle and 400 freestyle relay. Caskey won the 200 butterfly and also had the fastest time in the 100 butterfly race. Friedland won the 100 breaststroke, was on the first place 400 freestyle relay team and had the fastest time in the 200 breaststroke.
"It was a real fun day," said Friedland. "I had some competition in the breaststroke events and was able to swim well. We were able to stack our relays at the end and mine won which is always fun. We had a bunch of big swims in the beginning and swimming is a real momentum sport so we just kept going."
Divers Matt Cooper and Drew Livingston had the top two scores in both diving events. Livingston won the 1-meter competition with 411.83 points while Cooper was second with 403.05 points. In the 3-meter event, both were exhibition divers but had the top two scores. Cooper led the way with 444.45 while Livingston tallied 425.10 points.
Hoyland took third in the 100 breaststroke and McNeilis was third in the 200 freestyle while Johnson and Wilcox did not swim for the Longhorns.
Texas started strong with first and second place in the 200 medley relay. Winning the race was the A team consisting of Cole Cragin, Eric Friedland, Neil Caskey and Jimmy Feigen with a time of 1:29.56. The B team finished second as Patrick Murphy, Matt Hoyland, Madison Gibson and Kerrington Hill posted a time of 1:30.72.
Michael McBroom gave Texas nine points by winning the 1000 freestyle. He swam the race in 9:05.52 to finish over a second faster than Georgia's Andrew Gemmell. Patrick Murphy took first in the 200 backstroke.
The Longhorns finished 1,2 and 3 in the 200 freestyle and 100 backstroke. In the 200 freestyle, Dax Hill won the event with a time of 1:37.72 while Clay Youngquist was second and McNeilis third. Cole Cragin won the 100 backstroke with a time of 48.18 and was followed by Kip Darmody and Austin Surhoff.
Next weekend Texas will travel to Auburn for a dual meet Jan. 12-13 with action slated to begin at 5 p.m. on Friday and 1 p.m. on Saturday.
