By Dan D’Addona.
The No. 2 Cal men’s swim team defeated No. 15 USC 177-109 on Friday, winning all but one event.
A strong leadoff leg by senior Ryan Murphy got the Bears rolling in the 200-yard medley relay and Connor Hoppe, Justin Lynch and Pawel Sendyk finished in 1:25.61 and beat second-place USC by 17-hundreths of a second.
The energy of the relay win carried into the 1,000 freestyle, which Nick Norman won in a season-best time of 9:11.11 for the win.
A Cal duel broke out in the 200 free as senior Long Gutierrez and freshman Michael Jensen jumped ahead by the 100-yard mark. Gutierrez only got stronger as he went along and set his own season-best in the event, finishing in 1:35.00 and earning the win.
Murphy cruised to familiar results in the 100 and 200 backstroke, winning both races by a comfortable margin. USC picked up its lone swimming victory of the day with a win by Carsten Vissering in the 100 breaststroke but with Cal swimmers in second, third and fourth, the Bears nearly offset the points that the Trojans earned for finishing first and fifth.
Sophomore Andrew Seliskar won the 200 butterfly in 1:44.14.
