A back-to-back schedule of dual meets continued the Little Giants’ start to the swimming & diving season. With tough competition and close scores, Wabash came out with two out of three wins in these dual meets.
“Of course it can be mentally challenging, facing a team in back to back meets can be difficult and intimidating,” said Connor Craig ’25. “But at the end of the day, we’ve trust our training and know we’re getting put into situations in which we can handle.”
The Little Giants’ swimming & diving team took a trip down to Terre Haute, Indiana on October 25 to compete in their first duel meet of the 2024-25 season against the Fightin’ Engineers of Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. It was a Friday night that saw The Little Giants win several events. But in the end, they couldn’t rally as a team to reach the overall win. They lost 160-137 to host Rose-Hulman.
Distance swimmer Mason Gilliam ’28 took home two individual wins in the distance events. Gilliam scored a victory in the 1000-yard freestyle with a first place time of 9:54.59 and won the 500-yard freestyle with a final time in 4:50.90.
Ryan West ’28 and Barrett Smith ’26 took home 1st and 2nd place in the 100-yard backstroke with West coming out on top with a time of 54.15 while Smith took home 2nd with a time of 56.11.
Quinn Sweeney ’27 won the 200-yard butterfly with a time of 1:58.92 and Craig won the 50-yard freestyle with a time of 22.38.
It was a competitive meet throughout the whole night and the momentum continued as the Little Giants faced Albion College and Centre College on Saturday for the team’s first home meet at the Class of 1950 Natatorium.
The Little Giants came out victorious with a dominant score of 230-56 against Albion College but the main show was against Centre College, it was a duel that went down to the last relay race The Little Giants needed a first place and third place finish in the race to get the win and beat Centre.
To start the meet off, Wabash won the 200-yard medley relay. West, Justice Wenz ’25, Brody Page ’27, and Craig combined to finish in 1:40.28. Sweeney ’27 scored an individual victory in the 200-yard freestyle with a time of 1:46.46. Ethan Johns ’25 won the 100-yard freestyle with a speedy time of 48.44.
The various wins in multiple events for Wabash allowed for an exciting last relay race which had the possibility of determining the Little Giants as the winner of the dual meet. In the last relay race of the meet, Wabash needed a first and third place finish to capture the overall team win.
The Wabash relay of Johns, Sweeney, Daniel Streeter ’27, and Craig got the necessary win in the 200-yard freestyle relay with a first-place combined time of 1:28.02.
Then to bring home the meet win, John Allen ’26, Nicholas Hakimian ’25, Grayson Goff ’28 and Brock Schall ’27 finished the race in third place with a time of 1:30.44.
“It was a moment I was ready for,” said Schall. “I knew it was going to be a close race and I knew my teammates were counting on me to finish the race. So, I turned my brain off and let the adrenaline and training do the rest of the work.”
The final score of the meet was Wabash 151, Centre College 148.
It was a huge win for the Little Giants and they look to continue this momentum before the North Coast Athletic Conference meets start.
The team travels for meets on Friday, November 1 and Saturday, November 2 as they compete in the Western Michigan Invite. Friday’s competition takes place at Hope College, while Saturday’s competition will be hosted at Kalamazoo College.