WORCESTER, Mass. – The Brandeis swimming and diving teams competed in a multi-meet against four other teams on Friday evening. The Judges won ten individual races. The women won three of their four head-to-head competitions against Babson (143-129), Simmons (183-74) and Smith (149-130), while falling narrowly to host WPI (139-142). The men fell to Babson (175-109) and WPI (192-102).
Leading the way individually was senior Brendon Lu (Basking Ridge, N.J./Ridge), who won three races for the men. Lu captured the 1,000-yard freestyle by nine seconds with a time of 10:09.34; the 100-yard breaststroke with a time of 1:00.38, edging a Babson swimmer by 0.24 of a second; and the 200 breaststroke in 2:10.84 by a margin of three seconds over a Babson competitor.
Sophomore Sam Dienstag (Wilmette, Ill./New Trier) was a double-winner in mid-distance freestyle races. He took the 200 in 1:44.65 by about 2.5 seconds, and the 500 in 4:47.37, winning by nearly 10 seconds
On the women's side, first-year Anastasia Bekou (Limassol, Cyprus / Laniteio Lyceum) won the 100-yard backstroke in 1:00.56 by margin of about half a second. Classmate Chloe Gonzalez (Miami Beach, Fla. / Miami Beach Senior) captured the 100-yard freestyle with a time of 54.30 second, edging a WPI competitor by 0.45 seconds. She was also second in the 50 free (25.37 seconds) and third in the 100 butterfly (1:01.43). Junior Bailey Gold (Berkeley Heights, N.J. / Governor Livingston) captured the 500 free in 5:19.24, handily defeating the runner-up from Smith by nearly 13 seconds. Gold also finished second in the 100 fly with a time of 59.79 seconds, 0.7 behind the winner from Smith.
The Brandeis women also won both relays, with the team of Bekou, senior Olivia Stebbins (Willington, Conn. / Edwin O. Smith), Gold and junior Ema Rennie (Dublin, Ohio / Dublin Scioto) taking the 200 medley to open the meet with a time of 1:52.66, holding off a late-charging WPI squad by five-hundredths of a second. To end the meet, Rennie, sophomore Monica Iizuka (Chatham, N.J. / Chatham), Gonzalez and Gold won the 200 free relay in 1:41.15 by a margin of 0.58 seconds.
Other top performers for the Judges included first-year Andrew Ngo (San Gabriel, Calif. / Gabrielino), who placed third in the 100 breaststroke (1:00.75) and fourth in the 100 free (49.46 seconds); sophomore Ido Petel (New York, N.Y. / Frank McCourt), who was third in the 100 free (49.33 seconds), fifth in the 50 free (22.68 seconds) and sixth in the 200 free (1:49.99); junior James Barno (Ballston Spa, N.Y. / Ballston Spa), who was second in the 100 fly (53.07 seconds) and fifth in the 100 back (56.16 seconds); and first-year Gerald Deng (Rego Park, N.Y. / Bronx High School of Science), who was third in the 200 fly (2:01.81) and fifth in the 1,000 free (10:33.53).
For the women, other top non-winners were senior Abbie Etzweiler (Malvern, Pa. / Great Valley), who was fourth in the 1,000-yard freestyle (11:50.54) and fifth in the 500 (5:46.32); senior Gazelle Umbay (North Hills, Calif. / Sierra Canyon School), who was third in the 200 fly (2:17.79) and sixth in the 100 fly (1:02.18); and Iizuka, who was second in the 200 backstroke (2:13.34) and third in the 400 individual medley (4:55.81).
The Judges return to action on Saturday, November 13th, when they play host to cross-town rivals Bentley University.