The men's swimming team completed a disappointing dual meet season last Saturday against Cornell, losing 133-102 and lowering its record to 1-11-1.
But the team's performance was not without hopeful signs.
"The Cornell meet was a great way to end the dual meet season," Nick Gansner '97 said. "I think we have a good shot to beat some of the teams who beat us earlier in the season in dual meets" at the EISL Championships.
The Big Green fell behind 15-2 after the 200 medley relay. Doug Doucet '98 brought Dartmouth back within five points, winning the 1000 freestyle in 10:02.71. Teammate Jonathan Hurst '98 took third in 10:36.67, his personal best this season.
Cornell responded with a one-two finish in the 200 freestyle. Grier Laughlin '96 finished third in 1:48.60.
Captain Ross Downey '95 earned second place in the 200 individual medley with a 1:59.82, leaving the team behind 61-29 going into the first diving break.
From the beginning it looked bad for the Dartmouth divers, who faced some of the best divers in league. Grant Cerny '95 injured himself in warm-up, hitting the board on his third dive.
Though hobbled and bleeding, Cerny not only finished third on the three meter board, but he shattered his previous personal best, scoring 241.73 points.
Mark Devlin '98 took second with 245.48 points. Jeremy Turk '97 also turned in a personal best on the three meter with 209.63 points.
The team also dove extremely well on the one meter board. Devlin, Cerny, and Alex Katz '98 finished 2-3-4 with 245.03 points, 221.70 points, and 213.53 points respectively. Again, the score was a personal best for Cerny, despite diving with a heavily taped and swollen ankle.
Jon Kenyon '97 led the team in the second half of the meet. Kenyon finished a close second in the 100 freestyle, swimming a season best 47.57, only .07 seconds behind the winner.
But the highlight of the meet for Dartmouth was the 200 breaststroke.
The breaststrokers, led by Ben Lannon '96, took a one-two-three sweep. Lannon won the event in 2:12.90, followed by Gansner in 2:15.28 and John Marshall '95 in 2:19.42.
Several other individual swimmers also turned in personal best performances. Chris Whalen '97 was Dartmouth's top swimmer in the 100 breaststroke, finishing third in 1:05.02. Whalen also shaved two seconds off of his lifetime best in the 200 breaststroke with a time of 2:21.69.
Zev Starr-Tambor '97 also swam a lifetime best in the 200 freestyle, and barely missed another in the 500 freestyle. Jeff Jorgensen '97 also turned in a lifetime best of his own, splitting a 22.2 for the freestyle leg of the 200 medley relay.
"We had a lot of season best swims, and the taper guys swam really well," Gansner said. "So everyone is excited and optimistic for Easterns."
The team has a week off before traveling to Easterns at Princeton from March 2 to March 4. Although the team finished last in the rankings after the dual meet season, the Big Green will be looking to avenge close losses to Penn and Columbia. Dartmouth is also looking to beat Brown, a team it tied earlier in the season.
