Mestre, Shoults, Levant All Return For Stanford Men In Pacific Invite Win

Pacific Invite 2019

• Friday, October 18 – Saturday, October 19, 2019
• University of the Pacific, Stockton, CA
• SCY
• Invite format
• Full Results

The Stanford men cruised to an easy win at the Pacific Invite, but the big news is less about impressive times and more about some key names returning to action for the Cardinal.

Sprinter Alberto Mestre didn’t compete at all for Stanford last season and was sorely missed on relays in what would have been his sophomore season. But Mestre, now listed as a junior on Stanford’s roster, raced a full lineup at Pacific, winning the 50 free (20.49) along with three relays. Mestre split 19.8 on a medley, and was a good deal better on his 100 free relay splits (45.4 on a free relay and 45.0 on a medley) than he was individually (46.06 and only 4th overall).

Both Grant Shoults and Jack Levant dropped off last season with medical issues and didn’t swim NCAAs. The senior Shoults got two wins at Pacific: 1:38.09 in the 200 free and 15:03.12 in the mile. Shoults was about half a second faster in the 200 than he was at this meet in his last healthy season (2017), so the result bodes fairly well for Shoults’ fitness heading into his final NCAA season.

Levant, a sophomore, swam four individual events. His 1:38.61 in the 200 free was probably the most notable time, though it’s well off the 1:36.4 he went in early October last year as a freshman. Levant was also 1:51.74 in the 200 fly, 4:30.35 in the 500 free and 50.60 in the 100 fly.

The top contributors for Stanford this weekend, though, were seniors Benjamin Ho and Will MacMillan. Ho swept both backstrokes (49.46, 1:49.08) and also won the 200 IM (1:50.38). MacMillan took the 100 free (44.86) and 100 fly (49.59), and in the free, was significantly faster than his 46.5 time from this meet a year ago.

The women’s side didn’t include Stanford, but the host Pacific Tigers were almost as dominant as the Stanford men were. Pacific senior Taylor Hosmer won the 100 fly (1:00.00) and helped win three relays, while adding second-place finishes in the 200 free (1:54.51), 500 free (5:13.87) and 100 free (54.35).

Final Team Scores

Men:

1. Stanford – 1329
2. Pacific – 747
3. UC Santa Cruz – 521
4. Fresno Pacific – 497

Women:

1. Pacific – 1169
2. Fresno Pacific – 708
3. UC Santa Cruz – 665

Stanford press release:

STOCKTON, Calif. – No. 10 Stanford’s 2019-20 season kicked off on Friday and Saturday with a win at the Pacific Invitational.

The Cardinal amassed 1,329 points, well ahead of second-place Pacific (747), third-place UC Santa Cruz (521) and fourth-place Fresno Pacific University (497). Benjamin Ho led Stanford with five total wins, including three individual races, and Will Macmillan had the second-most with four wins.

Stanford started the meet by taking the top three spots in the 200-yard medley relay, led by the team of Ho, Hank Poppe, Macmillan and Alberto Mestre (1:29.48). Ho (49.46) made it two wins in a row, taking the top spot in the 100-yard backstroke while Shane Blinkman (51.19) placed third.

Poppe (53.62), Daniel Roy (55.53) and Brennan Pastorek (56.12) swept the podium in the 100-yard breaststroke before the Cardinal took the top eight spots in the 200-yard freestyle, led by winner Grant Shoults (1:38.09) and followed by Macmillan (1:38.17) and Jack Levant (1:38.61).

Roy (3:54.62) was the fastest swimmer in the 400-yard individual medley by over 13 seconds, ahead of second-place Blinkman (4:07.59) and third-place Jonathan Cook (4:09.99). Mestre (20.49) placed first in the 50-yard freestyle, ahead of third-place Ho (21.05) and Alex Liang (1:49.49) won the 200-yard butterfly while Macmillan (1:51.55) was second and Levant (1:51.74) third.

Stanford’s team of James Murphy, Matthew Hirschberger, Jordan Greenberg and Mestre (3:04.21) wrapped up Day 1 on Friday night with a win in the 400-yard freestyle relay.
Day 2 began in similar fashion with the quartet of Ho, Poppe, Macmillan and Mestre (3:17.19) earning the top spot in the 400-yard medley relay. Murphy (4:29.11) followed it up with a win in the 500-yard freestyle as teammates Levant (4:30.35) and Hirschberger (4:33.38) rounded out the podium.

Ho (1:49.08) won his fourth event, the 200-yard backstroke, ahead of Blinkman (1:51.04) and Alex Liang (1:53.76) before Macmillan (44.86) captured the 100-yard freestyle with Gonzalez (45.32) and Murphy (45.84) taking second and third place, respectively.

Roy (1:58.92) made it two individual wins with a victory in the 200-yard breaststroke ahead of Poppe (2:01.05) and Cook (2:05.86) and Macmillan (49.59) won his second event of the day, the 100-yard butterfly, with Sean Slusiewicz (50.32) and Levant (50.60) making it a one-two-three finish.

Ho (1:50.38) wasn’t finished, winning the 200-yard individual medley while Blinkman (1:51.27) finished second and Roy (1:51.67) placed third. Shoults (15:03.12) won the final individual event of the meet, the 1,650-yard freestyle, while freshman Andrew Matejka (15:57.78) was the runner up.

No. 10 Stanford hosts its Alumni Meet Oct. 25 at 5:30 p.m. PT followed by its annual Triple-Distance Meet against California in Berkeley, California, on Nov. 8. The Cardinal wraps up its fall season Nov. 21-23 at the Art Adamson Invitational in College Station, Texas.

Pacific press releases:

STOCKTON, Calif. – The Pacific women’s swimming program had a convincing victory at its annual Pacific Invitational, which was hosted on Friday and Saturday at Chris Kjeldsen Pool.

The Tigers topped its opposing teams — Fresno Pacific and UC Santa Cruz — with a total of 1,169 points. FPU finished second with 708 points, followed by UC Santa Cruz with 665 points.

Senior Taylor Hosmer had a stellar day in the pool, winning the 100 fly in one minute flat, while also snagging second place finishes in the 500 free (5:13.87) and the 100 free (54.35).

Angela Gagliardo claimed a victory in the 200 IM, clocking a time of 2:11.48. The senior from Burien, Wash. also had a third place finish (2:25.28) in the 200 breaststroke.

Brigid McNally wrapped up a great weekend, bringing her win total to five events. In addition to her three Friday victories (200 free, 400 IM, 400 free relay), McNally won the 500 free (5:07.08) and the 1650 free (17:56.46).

Also claiming second place finishes were Jessica Clark in the 200 backstroke (2:10.89) and Kesley Lloyd in the 200 breaststroke (2:22.39).

In the relays, Pacific’s A team — Gagliardo, Rosario, Gani, and Emery — finished second in the 400 medley relay with a time of 3:59.55. Then in the final relay of the day, the 200 free, Emery, Hosmer, Semaj Walker, Erin Oliphant combined for 1:40.61 victory.

Pacific will take a two-week break before traveling San Jose State, Calif. for its meet against San Jose State and UC Santa Cruz. The program is set to being at 11:00 a.m. Heat sheets will be made available at pacifictigers.com closer to the meet date.

STOCKTON, Calif. – The Pacific men’s swimming program recorded five top-five finishes on the final day of the Tiger-hosted Pacific Invite en route to a second place finish.

Winning the four-team meet was Stanford with 1,329 points. The Tigers followed with 747 points, while UC Santa Cruz totaled 521 points and Fresno Pacific totaled 497 points.

The men’s top finish on Saturday came in the 200 free relay. Dylan Parente, David Noyes, Erik Clemensen, and Andrew Davis combined for a fourth place finish with a time of 1:26.34. In the 200 medley relay, Pacific finished fifth (3:33.85) and sixth (3:35.42).

Freshman Richard Lewis led the Tigers in the 500 free with a fifth place time of 4:48.23. Lewis also competed in the 200 back, finishing sixth with a mark of 2:02.78.

Also snagging a fifth place finish on the day was Walker Wilson in the 200 back (2:01.89) and Nick Cisco in the 1650 free (17:19.55).

Leading the Tigers in the 200 breaststroke was Noah Snyder (6th, 2:12.99) and in the 100 fly was Michael Yang (6th, 51.23).

Diver, Mackaby Pennington traveled to California Baptist for the Lancer Diving Invite, where he finished second in both the one-meter dive (297.00) and the three-meter dive (324.65).

Pacific will take a two-week break before traveling to San Jose State for its neutral-site matchup against UC Santa Cruz. The program is set to begin at 11:00 a.m. Heat sheets will be made available at pacifictigers.com closer to the meet date.

UC Santa Cruz press release:

STOCKTON – UC Santa Cruz’s swimming teams opened their 2019-20 regular season with stiff competition at the University of the Pacific Invite Friday and Saturday. On the women’s side, UCSC faced the host Division I Tigers and Division II Fresno Pacific, while the men’s competition added Pac-12 power Stanford University.

With Stanford winning the men’s competition and UOP in the women’s, the Banana Slugs focused on getting their young squad acclimated to college competition.

“This was our first meet, we’ve been training hard for about a month now and we are hitting the ground running,” said junior Paul Ogle-Sporer. “We’re all very excited to keep training hard and give it our all in future competition.”

The Slugs opened on Friday with the 200 medley relays.  In the women’s 200, the A team of Elisabeth Lundgren, Kenya Lam and newcomers Emily Claridge and Isobel Blue finished fifth in an encouraging 1:53.72, just 4.6 seconds behind winners from Pacific.

The men’s 200 A relay (Victor Sowa and freshmen Sanjay Srikanth, Joseph Guzman and Max Mueller) finished in 1:41.65, good for seventh place behind teams from Stanford, UOP and Fresno Pacific. Srikanth was also 7th in the 100 back in 55.48.

Freshmen continued to impress on Day Two. Ocelli Rivers-Alteri led UCSC finishing fifth in the women’s 200 free in 1:59.93, and Aly Roberts placed sixth 0.58 seconds after her.  Blue was sixth in her 50 free college debut. She finished in 25.62, one second behind the 1-2 duo from Fresno Pacific. Another highlight was Mueller was UCSC top swimmer in the men’s 50 free, in 22.79.

The Banana Slugs’ best finish Saturday was the women’s 400 free relay, where the A team of Rivers-Alteri, Paris Sinclair, Lam and Blue were 3rd behind the two UOP teams in 3:46.56.

UCSC gets back in the pool next Friday when they host the Slug Shootout against Biola, Cal State East Bay, Mills and the College of Idaho.

Fresno Pacific press release:

STOCKON, CALIF. – The Sunbirds traveled up to the University of Pacific to compete in the Pacific invite on Friday, October 17^th and Saturday, October 19^th. Fresno Pacific’s women came in second while the men placed fourth.

“The men and women both had some strong swims and finished in the top three against division one schools. We need to continue to work hard towards our season goals and with each meet it is bring us closer to those goals. There are a lot of things that we can still improve on but I am proud of our team and how they adjusted from the late Friday night session to the early Saturday morning session,” said coach Adrian Aleksandrowicz.

HOW IT HAPPENED
Women  

• Olga Tovstogan won the 100-yard breaststroke with a time of 1:04.28 and the 200-yard breaststroke at 2:19.17. She also took second in the 200-yard IM (2:11.48).
• The Sunbirds took the top two spots in the 50-yard freestyle: Arianne Kooijinga finished first at 24.60 and Tovstogan came in shortly behind her at 24.64.
• FPU took the top three spots in the 100-yard backstroke: Kooijinga won the race with a time of 58.81, Ioanna Palla came in shortly behind her at 1:00.64, and Shelbi Hayzlett took third at 1:01.19.
• The 400-yard medley relay team of Kooijinga, Tovstogan, Genesis Navarrete and Palla took the race with a time of 3:59.01. b
• Arianne won the 200-yard backstroke with a time of 2:04.53 and the 100-yard freestyle with a time of 54.07.
• The 200-yard freestyle relay team consisting of Kooijinga, Hayzlett, Tovstogan, and Palla came in second with a time of 1:41.45.
• Palla came in second in the 100-yard butterfly with a time of 1:01.30.
• The 200-yard medley relay team made up of Ioanna Palla, Olga Tovstogan, Genesis Navarrete and Arianne Kooijinga placed third with a time of 1:49.80
• Remy Gordillo came in third in the 1650-yard freestyle with a time of 19:12.07
• FPU took three of the five top spots in the 200-yard butterfly: Sarah Anderson placed third (2:19.25), Remy Gordillo finished fourth (2:27.68) and Genesis Nararrette took fifth (2:28.23).
• Rebecca Tapia came in fourth in the 1650-yard freestyle with a time of 19:50.83.
• The team of Shelbi Hayzlett, Cookie Ortega, Remy Gordillo and Bailee Poole came in fourth in the 200-yard medley relay at 1:53.62.
• Cookie Ortega took forth in the 200-yard IM (2:15.01).
• In the 400-yard freestyle relay the team of Sarah Anderson, Genesis Navarrette, Bailee Poole and Rebecca Tapia took fourth (3:53.66).

Men  

• Iskender Baslakov placed second in the 100-yard backstroke with a time of 50.66.
• Dmitry Beloipetskiy finished second in the 50-yard freestyle at 20.96.
• The 200-yard reestyle team consisting of Iskender, Kirill, Oleksandr and Dmitry took third with a time of 1:25.78.
• Luke Landis took third in the 1650-yard freestyle with a time of 16:45.63.
• The team of Kirill Baron, Denisz Der, Dmitry Beloipetskiy and Olesandr Ivakin placed fourth in the 200-yard medley relay at 1:35.68.
• With a time of 58.02 Denisz Der took fourth in the 100-yard breaststroke.
• Iskender, Denisz, Kirill and Dmitry came in fourth in the 400-yard medley relay with a time of 3:31.82.
• In the 200-yard breaststroke Denisz took forth (2:07.11) and Dylan Sewell came in fifth (2:10.95).
• The 400-yard freestyle relay team took fifth with a time of 3:21.42. The team consisted of Trey McDaniel, Seth Nabors, Jarrett Takahashi and Luke Landis.