Amherst men’s swimming and diving wrapped up its 2016-17 season by competing in the NCAA Division III Championships. Team members who qualified traveled to the CISD Natatorium in Shenandoah, Texas to compete in the prestigious four-day meet, which took place March 15-18. Emory University won the team crown with 438 points, while Kenyon took second with 384 points, followed by Denison with 371 points. Amherst ended the meet with 35.5 points and a 20th place team finish out of the 52-team field.

On day one, first-years Eric Wong and Jack Koravos competed in individual events. Wong placed 30th in the 500-yard freestyle with a mark of 4:35.68, while Koravos took 35th in the 50-yard freestyle with a time of 21.02 seconds. Koravos also swam in the 200-yard medley relay, joined by teammates Sam Spurrell ’18, Elijah Spiro ’18 and Alex Dreisbach ’17. The team qualified for finals by swimming a preliminary time of 1:30.96. In the finals. Amherst posted a 14th-place finish with a time of 1:30.96, scoring six points.

The purple and white returned to the pool for day two of the competition. Amherst placed 21st in the 200-yard freestyle relay with a time of 1:23.49. Dreisbach (20.96) swam the first leg, followed by Charlie Seltzer ’19 (21.15), then Wong (20.94) and Koravos (20.44), who anchored the relay. In the 100-yard butterfly, Koravos and Spurrell finished 29th and 30th, with times of 49.71 seconds and 49.78 seconds, respectively. The 400-yard medley relay was the final event of the day for the purple and white. Spurrell, Spiro, Koravos and Dreisach made up the relay team, which finished 17th overall with a time of 3:20.92.

Amherst had another strong showing on day three. Sam Spurrell’s speedy performance in the 200-yard butterfly highlighted the meet. In the preliminaries, Spurrell recorded a time of 1:48.56 — two seconds faster than his seed mark of 1:50.68 and enough to take sixth place, qualifying him for the finals. In the finals, Spurrell posted another quick time of 1:49.74, earning him eighth place overall and eleven points for the team.

The 800-yard relay also had a solid performance, beating its seed time and finishing in a time of 6:42.26. The quartet of Seltzer (1:38.69), Wong (1:40.16), Koravos (1:41.29) and Connor Haley ’17 (1:42.12) made up the relay team. Spiro and Sean Mebust ’20 finished the day with strong performances in the 100-yard breaststroke. Spiro placed 27th in 56.79, while Mebust was close behind with a 29th-place finish in a time of 56.88.

Mebust returned for the 200-yard breaststroke on day four, in which he placed 12th overall with a time 2:01.96. Koravos, Wong, Seltzer and Dreisbach competed in the 400-yard relay, placing 15th with a time of 3:02.74. Wong also swam in the 1650-yard freestyle, in which he placed 22nd overall with a time of 16:35.33, to close the meet for Amherst.