The Pomona-Pitzer Colleges won three of the four relay events to take an opening day lead in both the men’s and the women’s standings at the 2016 Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Championships in La Mirada, Calif.
The Sagehen men lead the field with 149 points. Claremont-Mudd-Scripps doesn’t trail by much with 136 points. Cal Lutheran’s 115 points is just enough to edge out in front of Redlands 114 points. Whittier is in fifth with 86 points and Occidental is close behind with 84. Caltech’s 81 points places it seventh, Chapman’s 54 points place it eighth and La Verne is in ninth with 53 points.
On the women’s side, the Sagehens jumped out to a 21 point lead with 118 points in day one. Redlands is second with 97 and Occidental is third with 87. Whittier is in fourth with 82 points, CMS is in fifth 80 points, La Verne is sixth with 78 points and Cal Lutheran is seventh with 76. Chapman sits in eighth with 72 points and Caltech’s 50 points places it last.
The Sagehens began the finals portion of the day by sweeping the 200 medley relays. The men’s team of Samuel To, Teddy Koerner, Daniel Villars and Phillip Clayman nearly had an automatic qualifying time into the NCAA Championships with a 1:31.46 to win the title. Claremont-Mudd-Scripps came in just behind with a 1:31.70 while was third with a 1:33.23.
The Sagehen women’s foursome of Angela Ling, Mackenzie Cummings, Sarah Jin and Madison Kauahi took home the 200 medley relay title as well with a 1:44.45 – an NCAA “A” cut. Redlands came in second with a 1:46.51 and La Verne took third with a 1:51.62.
The men’s diving got underway with the trials and finals on the 3-meter board while the women had the 1-meter diving preliminaries. CMS’ Patrick Quarberg won the 3-meter diving title with a 499.60. La Verne’s Scott McKay took second with a 488.15 and Redland’s Lucas Redell took third with a 355.50.
Pomona-Pitzer continued its dominance in the men’s 800 free relay. Phillip Clayman, Samuel To, Jack Swanson and Mark Hallman posted an NCAA “B” cut time of 6:45.32. Cal Lutheran also had a provisional qualifying time with a 6:47.17. CMS narrowly took third with a 6:47.32.
The CMS women took their first event win in the women’s 800 free relay. Emma Stacy, Lauren Rosenberger, Elizabeth Carrade and Riley Hoffman earned an NCAA provisional qualifying time of 7:39.03 to win the title. Pomona-Pitzer took second with a 7:43.48 and Cal Lutheran edged out by .08 seconds Redlands for third with a 7:49.30.
The championship meet continues tomorrow with the 500 free, 200 IM, 50 free and women’s 3-meter diving finals.
Chapman Athletics contributed this report.
