After three days of fierce competition, the Bucknell Open is finally over. Columbia’s male swimmers return to the city with a second-place finish out of seven teams. Princeton topped the charts with 1,609 points overall but the Light Blue stayed strong with 1,125.5.
The Lions grabbed their first 36 points with an eighth-place finish in the 200-yard freestyle relay. The team consisting of Joe Jeffers, Mitch Phillips, Johnny Bailey, and Bruno Esquen touched the wall in 1:28.21, only four seconds behind Princeton’s winning squad.
The Light Blue also had a strong showing in the 500 freestyle in which sophomore Alex Smith finished first for Columbia, nabbing a seventh-place finish in 4:45.96. Freshman Sean MacKenzie grabbed ninth, swimming 4:44.54 in the finals followed by freshman Joe Beutler in 11th in 4:45.81.
In one of his many point-scoring finishes, senior Darren Pagan took 11th in the 200 individual medley with a time of 1:54.94 in the finals.
Junior Adam Powell broke the pool record with his first-place finish in the 50‑yard freestyle. Powell was the fastest in the preliminaries with a time of 19.81 seconds, which he improved to 19.76 in the finals as he blew out the competition by over a full second.
Another big point winner for the Light Blue was the 400 medley relay team which took second behind Princeton with the help of freshman Patrick Dougherty, senior Ross Ramone, Esquen, and Powell.
In the diving pool, junior David Levkoff represented the Lions with his fifth-place finish with 281.75 points in the finals of the 1m dive.
After a full day of competition, Columbia headed into day two in fifth place with 272 points.
The second day saw more Light Blue success as the Lions moved into fourth starting with a 52‑point contribution from the victorious 200 medley relay team. The group composed of Bailey, senior Eric Tang, Esquen, and Powell beat Princeton’s top team out by six-tenths of a second for first place.
Esquen stepped up to take fourth in the 100 butterfly in 50.95 seconds. Teammate Pagan scored as well, finishing eighth in 51.60.
Powell then stepped up again, propelling himself to an individual first place for a second time, this time in the 100 backstroke. Bailey and Dougherty combined for another 47 points as they finished sixth and seventh respectively in the event.
With a sixth-place finish in the 800 freestyle relay and Jason Collazo’s seventh-place finish in the 3-meter dive, the Lions headed into day three with 728.5 points, just half a point out of third.
The final day of competition saw a big momentum shift for the Light Blue. Columbia started the day with second- and sixth-place finishes in the 1,650 freestyle. MacKenzie dove in again, falling behind only one Princeton swimmer and finishing in 15:55.43. Smith grabbed sixth for the Lions in 16:30.21.
Powell set his second pool record of the weekend, coasting to victory in the 100 freestyle with a time of 43.91, over a second and a half ahead of second place.
The Lions sent two swimmers to the A‑final of the 200 breaststroke and capitalized on the points up for grabs. Tang took 26 for himself with a fourth-place, 2:08.54 finish. Senior Ross Ramone grabbed another 24 points as he finished close behind in sixth in 2:08.81.
Columbia had great representation in the finals of the 200 butterfly. Esquen finished fourth in 1:56.38 just ahead of senior Nick Barron in sixth in 1:56.62. The Lions took up half of the pool in the B‑final as senior Robert Eyckmans, junior Josh Brown, sophomore Shane Tutass, and Smith took 10th, 11th, 15th, and 16th respectively. The men gathered an additional 125 points for the Light Blue in this event alone.
In the last event of the weekend, Columbia took second as the relay team of Pagan, Dougherty, Phillips, and Powell touched the wall in 3:05.38 in the 400 freestyle relay.
When everyone had exited the pool, the final scoreboard reflected the team’s immense effort as the Lions had leapt from fourth to second with a grand total of 1,125.5 points, ahead of Bucknell, Brown, La Salle, Rider, and Syracuse.
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