First-place finishes by the 200 medley relay team and senior Brandon Peacock (Crawfordsville, IN/Crawfordsville) in the 100 butterfly, along with six other top-three finishes, helped propel the Wabash swimming team into second place at the DePauw Invitational on Saturday.
Wabash started the second day of the two-day invite in third place. On Friday the Little Giants finished with 296 points, trailing defending champion Washington University (434 points) and the host DePauw University Tigers (314.5 points).
Wabash had six top-three finishes on the first day. The Little Giants started the meet with a third in the 200-yard freestyle relay, finishing in 1:29.15. Senior Brett Findley (Bargersville, IN/Franklin Community) (right) took third in the 500 free (4:56.01) and the 200 butterfly (2:01.35), trimming over four seconds off of his preliminary time. Sophomore Matt Perkins (Indianapolis, IN/Brownsburg) added a second in the 200 backstroke, touching the pad in 1:58.90, nearly three seconds faster than his prelim time. Senior Stephen Birrer (Indianapolis, IN/Brownsburg) took second in the 100 free with a time of 49.36, keeping Washington from sweeping the top four places in the event. The Little Giants added a third place finish in the 800-yard free relay to set up the final events on Saturday.
Wabash started the day strong when Perkins, Colin Fahey (JR/Indianapolis, IN/Bishop Chatard), Kyle Weaver (FR/Portland, IN/Jay County), and Peacock finished almost three seconds ahead of the second place team from DePauw in the 200 medley relay to capture 40 first place points. Junior Ben Hewitt (Greenwood, IN/Center Grove) followed with a third place finish in the 400 individual medley with a time of 4:19.73, three seconds under his qualifying time. Fahey added more points to the Wabash total with a second place finish in the 50 free (22.32). Perkins followed with another strong swim, this time in the 100 backstroke with a third place finish after touching in 54.33. Hewitt grabbed another second for the Little Giants, swimming the 200 breaststroke in 2:13.69, trimming two seconds off of his prelim time.
Peacock (left and photo at top of page) gave Wabash its second first-place finish of the meet, outtouching two swimmers from Washington University with a time of 53.09. After the two Washington swimmers finished second and third, it was all Wabash in the next three spots as Birrer, Perkins, and Weaver added a total of 42 points to the 20 points already snared by Peacock to the Wabash totals. Birrer took fourth (54.11), Perkins was fifth (54.24), while Weaver finishes sixth (55.53).
Findley added one final second place finish for the Little Giants, taking the number two spot in the 1650 freestyle with a time of 17:06.78. The final relay race of the meet saw Wabash touch third. Birrer, Peacock, Findley, and Fahey brought the 400 free relay home in 3:19.10 to pick up 32 points for the Wabash total.
Washington won the meet for the second consecutive year, finishing with 805 points. The Little Giants score 645 points over two days for second place. DePauw (609.5), Wittenberg (464.5), Rose-Hulman (395), Illinois Wesleyan (215), Alma (186), Rhodes (132), and Principia (84) rounded out the nine-team scoring.
The Little Giants will head to the Bahamas over the holidays for training before picking up the 2004 portion of the season on January 9 and 10 at the University of Indianapolis Invitational.