Stanford Women, Ohio State Men Dominate OSU Invitational

Ohio State's Josh Fleagle. Photo Courtesy: Ohio State University Athletics

By Dan D’Addona.

Katie Ledecky broke three NCAA records and two American records to lead the Stanford Cardinal to victory at the Ohio State Invitational.

Stanford scored 1,080 points to dominate the meet. Kentucky finished second (615), followed by Ohio State (609), Yale (385), Iowa (375), Pitt (342), Utah (279), Penn State (198.5), Washington State (147.5) and Kenyon (15).

Ledecky set the tone early for Stanford with an NCAA record-setting swim in the first race of the meet. On Friday morning, Ledecky finished the 500-yard freestyle with a record time of 4:27.54. That record stood for a few hours until she broke her own American record in the event with a finish of 4:26.46 in the finals.

On Sunday, Ledecky broke the NCAA record in the 1,650 free by 21 seconds and her American record by 10 seconds. In that same race, her 1,000 split time of 9:08.99 topped the NCAA mark she had set in the 1,000 free at Avery Aquatic Center on Nov. 12. Ledecky’s time of 15:03.92 was more than a minute faster than second place.

In the men’s meet, host Ohio State held off the field. The Buckeyes won with 1,233 points, followed by Utah (746.5), Kentucky (629.5), Penn State (488.5), Iowa (375.5), Pitt (317), Stanford (108) and Kenyon (92).

On Sunday, Ohio State’s Thomas Trace started by winning the 200 backstroke in 1:43.72.

The 100 freestyle and 200 breaststroke had a similar ending: Ohio State swimmers took spots two through four. In the 100 free, it was Josh Fleagle (43.02), Matt McHugh (43.97), and Mark Belanger (44.21), and their teammates Brandon Fronczak (1:59.34), Michael Eaton (1:59.94), and Andrew Lindstrom (2:00.79) did the same in the 200 breast.

For the women, it was Cardinal domination.

Sophomore Ella Eastin swept the individual medleys with a pair of meet records, and added another victory in the 200 butterfly. She set the meet record in the 200 IM at 1:54.06 on Friday, and followed with a winning time of 4:00.36 in the 400 IM on Saturday. She edged Ledecky in the 400 by 31-tenths of a second as both swimmers earned A qualifying times for the NCAA Championships. Freshman Allie Szekely was third in the event with a B standard qualifier of 4:05.63. In the 200 fly, Eastin won with a time of 1:52.62, while Lindsey Engel was third at 1:57.89.

Junior Janet Hu followed with a meet record and A qualifying time in the 100 butterfly (51.05), while classmate Lindsey Engel was third at 52.93. Hu was edged by teammate Ally Howe in the 100 backstroke as the duo finished with A qualifying times, Howe in 50.91 and Hu in 51.01. Hu won the 200 backstroke (1:50.69).

The Cardinal claimed the top five spots in the preliminaries and finals of the 200 free. Simone Manuel (1:41.90), Ledecky (1:42.16), Drabot (1:44.93), Lia Neal (1:45.16) and Nicole Stafford (1:45.26) were the first to finish among the 10 swimmers in the A final and 94 swimmers overall. Meanwhile, Manuel (47.27), Neal (47.70) and Drabot (49.03) were first, second and fourth in the 100 free.

Stanford’s divers were led by returning Olympian Kassidy Cook, who was the runner-up on the 1-meter with a score of 283.90, and freshman Haley Farnsworth‘s was third (293.70) on 3-meter.

Stanford also swept the relays. Neal, Manuel, Hu and Howe set a meet record in the 200 free relay (1:27.72), while Howe, Kim Williams, Hu and Manuel were tops in the 400 medley relay (3:29.63) on Friday. The following night, Howe, Heidi Poppe, Hu and Manuel won the 200 medley relay (1:36.53) and the foursome of Ledecky, Drabot, Manuel and Eastin set pool and meet records in the 800 free relay (6:55.54). In the final event of the meet, Hu, Ledecky, Manuel and Neal won the 400 free relay in 3:12.55.

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