2024 Purdue Invite
- November 21-23, 2024
- Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana
- Short Course Yards (25 yards), Prelims/Finals
- Live Results
- Day 1 Full Results (PDF)
- Live Results
While they didn’t win any of the four relays on day one of their hosted invitational, a boost from Purdue’s elite diving crew and depth in a few select events gave them the lead after day one of the 2024 Purdue Invite.
Women’s Standings
- Purdue – 349
- FIU – 196
- Southern Illinois – 140
- Grand Canyon – 121
- Illinois State – 111
- McKendree – 78
Men’s Standings
- Purdue – 299
- Grand Canyon – 251
- McKendree – 186
- Southern Illinois – 137
The men’s and women’s team swam opposite relays on day 1 of the meet.
Men’s Recap
Grand Canyon kicked off the meet with a 3:08.89 win in the 400 medley relay, which is already a second-and-a-half faster than they were last season.
The opening leg (Alex Volkov, backstroke – 46.36) and closing leg (Guillermo Carrey, freestyle – 43.19) return from last year’s relay, but the ‘Lopes have swapped out the middle two legs and that’s where most of the difference came. Harper Houk split 52.80 on breaststroke and Jasu Ovaskainen split 46.54 on the fly leg.
D2 McKendree was not far behind in 3:09.43, which is the top time in D2 so far this season by about four-tenths of a second over Tampa’s 3:09.94 on Wednesday night in South Carolina.
McKendree sophomore Christian Davidson won the 500 free in 4:24.52, which was about two seconds better than the best time that got him 3rd at last year’s GLVC Championship meet.
The hosts from Purdue had a rough start to the night (four-and-a-half seconds back in the 400 medley relay), but Matheo Mateos got the Boilermakers their first win of the night in the 200 IM in 1:46.29. He was the Summit League Champion in both IMs last season at Lindenwood, but transferred to Purdue after his old program was cut.
A 30.84 breaststroke split was the difference for Mateos over McKendree’s Vova Gavrysh, who finished 2nd in 1:46.67. That was a three second drop for Gavrysh, a freshman from Ukraine.
Southern Illinois’ Alex Santiago won the 50 free in 19.45, which was about three tenths better than he was at the A3 Invitational last week (SIU is pulling double invite duty). That’s shy of his lifetime best from last year’s MAC Championships where he swam 19.12 to win the conference title and qualify for the NCAA Championships,
The last individual event of the night was the diving, and that’s where Purdue took a big bite out of the competition. Led by a Meet Record of 429.75 from Max Miller, the Boilermakers divers went 1-2-3-4-5 on 1-meter, scoring 82 points in the event. Grand Canyon scored 45 points, McKendree scored 13 points, and Southern Illinois didn’t bring their divers.
McKendree finished the night with a dominant win in the 800 free relay, winning in 6:27.10. They were second in this race at NCAAs last season. This time put them exactly 8 seconds ahead of the runners-up from Purdue.
Women’s Recap
Much like the men’s meet, the women’s meet saw a variety of winners.
Among the top swimmers to watch throughout the week is Southern Illinois and All-America Celia Pulido. At this meet last season, she had her breakout 51.8 in the 100 back to book a second-straight trip to NCAAs before dropping a second to finish 7th in March.
She got her first crack of the night in the session-ending 400 medley relay, splitting 52.10 on the backstroke leg of Southern Illinois’ winning 400 medley relay (3:34.85). She combined with Olivia Herron (1:00.09), Maria Padron (53.38), and Susana Hernandez (49.28) to smash the school record of 3:37.46 set in the team’s dual meet against UIC earlier this season. The school record coming into the season was 3:38.56, and the record heading into last season was just 3:41.26, meaning they’ve dropped over 6 seconds off the old record in a season-and-a-half.
Purdue finished 2nd in 3:34.85 including a 48.25 anchor from Lara Phipps that was the fastest in the field by more than a second.
SIU also time-trialed a 200 medley relay, touching in 1:37.21 – just .04 seconds shy of the NCAA “B” standard.
Herron, the lone non-Central American on that winning 400 medley relay, also gave the Salukis an individual win on the day. She won the 200 IM in 1:57.70. That’s about half-a-second slower than she was last week, but is part of a total 3.4 second drop so far this season in that event. This time would have easily won last year’s Missouri Valley Championship (2:01.16).
Maria Brunlehner finished 2nd in 1:59.26, charging back on the field with a 26.99 final 50 split.
It was FIU that opened the session with a win in the 200 free relay, finishing in 1:30.31. The quartet of Tawannah McLemore (23.00), Jessica Shpiklo (22.43), Diana Santamaria (22.26), and Oumy Diop (22.62) combined for the program’s best time since the 2021-2022 season.
They once again held off a hard late charge from Phipps and Purdue; she anchored the Boilermakers’ runner-up 200 free relay in 22.08 as they finished in 1:30.71.
While Phipps was the best sprinter on the relays, she was just 7th in the individual 50 free (23.18). That event was won by her teammate Hannah Hill in 22.70.
After missing the second-half of last season, Hill opened the season with a lifetime best of 22.32 in the 50 free, and including a prelims 22.61 has now been under her 2023-2024 season best five times.
Purdue got a pair of women’s individual swimming wins on day one, with Kate Mouser taking the 500 free in 4:46.11. She dropped half a second to lead a 1-2-3-4-5-6-8 finish for the Boilermakers’ best performance of the day. Caitlin Hurley also went a best time of 4:47.64 for 2nd place.
That time moves Mouser into 7th all-time in Purdue program history.
The lone interrupter of an all-Purdue A-Final was Jocelyn Zgola in 7th with a best time of 4:58.89.
The Purdue women were almost as dominant as their men on the boards, going 1-2-3-5 led by a Meet Record score of 389.18 from Sophie McAfee.
