At the midway point of the 2016 NCAA Division III Swimming and Diving Championships Denison and Kenyon are embroiled in another epic duel. Through 10 events, Denison's neighbors to the north hold a 14.5 point lead over Denison. Kenyon enters day three with 272.5 points while Denison has totaled 258 points. Emory sits in third place with 205 points while Johns Hopkins is fourth with 152.
In the second event of the night, Jack Lindell cruised to a six-second win over second-place Ian Reardon of Kenyon, touching in a school record time of 3:47.63. He trimmed 5.05 seconds off his time in morning prelims while breaking his own varsity record of 3:50.02 set in December at the Miami Invitational. Lindell is the fifth individual in NCAA Division III history to win the 200 IM and the 400 IM in the same year. He is the second individual from Denison to win the event. Matt Trumbull was a two-time national champion in the 400 IM in 1996 and 1998.
In the consolation final of the 400 IM, North Coast Athletic Conference Newcomer of the Year, Mitch Williams, finished third in the heat, resulting in an 11th place finish in 3:59.35. He took 1.16 seconds off his morning time. While Denison was celebrating another stellar swim by Lindell, Kenyon was making its move up the leaderboard. DU entered the event leading the Lords by 9.5 points. Powered by five, top-10 finishes in the 400 IM, Kenyon outscored DU 63-26 in the event to take a 27.5 point lead into the 100 fly.
In the 100 fly, senior Andrew Rich posted the best finish of his career in his signature event, touching in a PR time of 47.85. Rich's previous three swims in the 100 fly at nationals resulted in ninth, 15th and 13th place finishes, respectively. Washington University's Reed Dalton repeated as national champion in 47.22.
The Big Red would claw back into the team championship race, outscoring Kenyon 25-2 in the 200 freestyle. Senior Joe Brunk placed fifth in 1:38.43 to pick up 14 points. That was a one-spot improvement over his sixth-place finish in 2015. In the consolation final, Ryan Fleming opened with a 23.01 50 split and closed strong, tying for the consolation heat win with Andrew Bauer of Worcester Poly Tech in 1:38.59. That was a 10-spot improvement over Fleming's 19th place showing in 2015. Earning three points toward Denison's cause in the event was first-year Ryan Stevenson who placed 14th in 1:39.82, picking up the first All-American certificate of his career.
The first event of the night was the 200 freestyle relay and the team of Fleming, Jason Wesseling, Brendan Howley and Conrad Wuorinen logged a fourth-place finish in 1:21.12. Wuorinen anchored the relay with a 20.03 50 free split. Emory won the event in 1:19.83 as Oliver Smith posted an anchor split of 18.90 to lead the Eagles to the win.
The final event of night two was the 400 medley relay and the team of Lindell, Howley, Fleming and Rich touched in fifth place but would end up fourth in 3:16.48 after the winning relay from Washington University was disqualified on the final exchange. The WashU DQ was pivotal because the victory would go to Kenyon in 3:15.20. That resulted an additional six points for the Lords.
Denison will return to the Greensboro Aquatic Center on Friday for preliminaries and finals in the 200 fly, 100 back, 100 breaststroke, 1-meter dive and the 800 free relay. Max Levy is the defending national champion on the 1-meter board and the Big Red's 800 free relay team has the top time this season at 6:35.72. Preliminaries will begin at 10 a.m. with finals starting at 6 p.m.
