2016 ACC Championships: Day 3 Finals Live Recap

2016 ACC MEN’S CHAMPIONSHIPS

• When: Wednesday, Feb. 24 – Saturday, Feb. 27; Prelims 10AM/Finals 6PM (Eastern Time)
• Where: Greensboro Aquatic Center, Greensboro, NC
• Defending Champion: NC State (results)
• Streaming: watchESPN
• Championship Central
• Live Results
• Fan Guide

Last year’s champions return to defend their crowns in four of five individual finals tonight, the third day  of the 2016 Men’s ACC Championship.  Louisville’s Nolan Tesone took the top seed this morning in the 400 IM with a time of 3:42.69, but he will have to hold off defending champion Robert Owen of Virginia Tech, who will be swimming right next to Tesone in lane five this evening.  Another Cardinal, Pedro Coutinho, seeks to defend his title in the 100 fly, after securing lane four with a 46.02 swim this morning.  Another returning champion, NC State’s Simonas Bilis, has the top seed in the 200 free after blasting a 1:33.09 this morning, one of the fastest times in NCAA this season.

The 100 breast is the only individual event this evening that will not feature a title defense.  Last year’s winner, Louisville’s Thomas Dahlia, graduated, and Virginia Tech junior Brandon Fiala comes into this evening with the top seed after swimming being the only swimmer to dip below 52 seconds this morning.  His time of 51.86 currently stands as the pool and meet record.  The final individual event will be the 100 back, where once again, last year’s winner, this time Grigory Tarsevich of Louisville, will be in lane four after posting a 46.21 in prelims.

NC State has won every relay so far this meet, but Louisville will seek to end the Wolfpack’s stranglehold on relays this evening in the 400 medley relay.  The Cardinals come in as the top seed, and won this event last year in 3:06.06.

• Prelims recap
• Day 3 Ups/Mids/Downs

Keep refreshing this page for live event-by-event updates from Greensboro as they happen.

Note: The ACC men’s diving events happened last week. Those scores will be added into the live results tallies as each diving event is reached in the traditional meet order. But in order to give readers more up-to-date scores, we’ll be tracking the team scores with all three diving events already included in the totals.

400 IM – Finals

1.  Robert Owen, VT – 3:41.08
2. Nolan Tesone, LOU – 3:41.41
3. Christian McCurdy, NCSU – 3:44.06

Continuing a theme that we saw last night, the top three finishers tonight were the same three men as last year.  Virginia Tech’s Robert Owens jumped out to an early lead, but Louisville Cardinal Nolan Tesone took the lead during the backstroke leg, continued to extend his lead throughout the breaststroke, and still led by a second heading into the final 50.  But Owen stormed back, out splitting Tesone 25.12 to 26.24 over the last lap and touching first to defend his crown and set a new pool record, 3:41.08.

Tesone’s, last year’s third-place finishers, touched just behind Owen, in 3:41.41.  NC State’s Christian McCurdy, who placed second last year held off teammate Austin Synder, 3:44.06 to 3:44.39, for third and fourth place.

100 Fly – Finals

1.  Sam Lewis, UNC – 45.77
2. Justin Plaschka, ND – 46.37
3. Pedro Coutinho, LOU – 46.46

UNC’s Sam Lewis jumped out to an early lead and never relented, winning in 45.77, a NCAA automatic qualifying time, with the fastest first and second 50s in the field.  Norte Dame’s Justin Plaschka, swimming out of lane 8, was the only other swimmer to drop time from this morning, as he had the second fastest back half of the race and dropped .71 from prelims to take second in 46.37.

Last year’s champion, Louisville’s Pedro Coutinho, took third in 46.46.  Louisville had two other swimmers in the A-final, and those three swimmers garnered the Cardinals 76 points, which puts them ahead of Virginia Tech for second place at the moment, if you don’t factor in the diving points.  Once you do factor in the Hokies’ 88 points from platform diving, VT still has almost a 40 point lead over Louisville.

200 Free – Finals

1. Simonas Bilis, NCSU – 1:32.46
2. Soeren Dahl, NCSU – 1:32.88
3. Ryan Held, NCSU – 1:32.97

This NC State team has built its reputation around the sprint freestyles, but if you needed anymore indication that the Wolfpack can handle middle distance (you know, just in case last year’s 2nd place NCAA finish wasn’t enough evidence), NC State swept the top three spots in this event tonig.ht, with all three men finishing under 1:33.

Simonas Bilis, last year’s champion, was 21.35 to the feet on his first 50, followed closely by teammate Ryan Held, who then split 23.81 over the next 50 to take a narrow lead.  Louisville’s Trevor Carroll actually had the fastest split on that second 50 (23.72), and around the halfway mark, it was still a four-man race.  The fourth man was Soeren Dahl, who then split 23.21 for the third 50 to close on teammates Bilis and Held.  But Bilis surged ahead over the final lap to overtake Held and repeat as champion.

All three NC State men finished with NCAA “A” cuts, while Carroll finished in fourth by a wide margin, touching in 1:33.52.

100 Breast – Finals

1. Derek Hren, NCSU – 52.27
2. Brandon Fiala, VT – 52.28
3. Carlos Claverie, LOU – 52.41

In all four races so far this evening, the man who was in the lead after the first 50 went on to win the event.  This time, it was NC State’s Derek Hren, last year’s runner-up.  Hren went out over two-tenths ahead of anyone else.  Virginia Tech’s Brandon Fiala, who dipped under 52 this morning in this event, and Louisville’s Carlos Claverie, both closed on Hren a little bit, but couldn’t run him down.

Going into the final individual event of the evening, NC State has a clear lead, with 797 points.  Whether you factor in platform diving or not, Louisville is now squarely in second, with Virginia Tech in third.  Including all diving points, the Cardinals have 665.5 points, while the Hokies have 630.

100 Back – Finals

1. Gregory Tarasevich, LOU – 45.28
2. Andreas Schiellerup, NCSU – 45.87
3. Hennessey Stuart, NCSU – 45.92

UNC Tarheel Nicolas Graesser went out in a blistering 21.95.  Last year’s champion, Louisville’s Grigory Tarasevich, wasn’t too far behind at 22.15, and went on to have the fastest split in the second half of the race, touching in 45.28, almost a second faster than his winning time from last year.  That time was a new ACC record and a NCAA automatic qualifying time.  NC State took second and third in the race, courtesy of Andreas Schiellerup (45.87) and Hennessey Stuart (45.92), while Graesser touched just behind Stuart in fourth (46.00).

400 Medley Relay – Finals

1. Louisville – 3:04.90
2. NC State – 3:06.25
3. North Carolina – 3:07.96

Louisville led this relay from start to finish.   Tarasevich led off 45.81 to give the Cardinals the early lead, just over 30 minutes after winning the individual 100 back.  NC State came back a little bit thanks to breaststroker Hren’s leg, but Claverie preserved the lead and it handed it off to Coutinho, who had the fastest split in the field.  It was still a close race at the 300 mark, as NC State was only .43 behind, but Trevor Carroll outsplit Joe Bonk 41.67 to 42.61.

Team Scores

With diving points added in, here are the team points through two days of competition: