Shaine Casas Blasts 1:38 200 IM at Art Adamson Invite to move up to 3rd all-time
Texas A&M hosted the Art Adamson Invitational starting Wednesday night in College Station with just LSU, Incarnate Word and host Texas A&M in attendance. A&M junior Shaine Casas had the best performance of the day on Wednesday with a stellar 1:38.95 in the 200 IM which put him third all-time in the event behind only Caeleb Dressel and 2019 NCAA champ Andrew Seliskar.
Casas’ previous best was a 1:39.91 from last year’s SECs where he entered NCAAs as the top seed and was in line to potentially win his first NCAA title with the Aggies. But ultimately the meet was cancelled, but that has not hindered Casas who has dropped nearly a full second on his best time. Casas returned later in the night to lead off the medley relay with a 44.25 as his best was from last year at 44.48.
Men’s 200 IM All-Time Rankings:
- 1:38.13, Caeleb Dressel, 2018
- 1:38.14, Andrew Seliskar, 2019
- 1:38.95, Shaine Casas, 2020
- 1:39.35, Andreas Vazaios, 2019
- 1:39.38, David Nolan, 2015
A&M senior Mark Theall also scored a best time in the 500 freestyle with a 4:10.67, improving a tenth on his best time that he also set at last year’s SECs which put him fourth in the nation last year. Theall won ahead of Texas A&M’s Luke Stuart (4:21.88) while A&M junior Coco Bratanov was second in the 200 IM at 1:44.17.
LSU sophomore Brooks Curry won the 50 free with a 19.28 over A&M’s Tanner Olson (19.39) as the rising star out of Atlanta improved on his best of 19.30 from last season.
“There is obvious excitement with another improvement for Brooks,” said LSU Coach Dave Geyer. “However, there is room for him to continue to improve as well.”
A&M freshman Chloe Stepanek, who made her debut this semester coming out of Long Island, won the 500 free (4:44.40) and the 50 (22.26) as she won a tight battle with teammate Camryn Toney (4:45.19) in the 500 and LSU’s Katarnia Milutinovich (22.76) in the 50.
A&M senior Jing Quah took the 200 IM with a 1:57.25 ahead of LSU’s Summer Stanfield (1:59.69).
Texas A&M closed the night with a win in both 400 medley relays as the women’s relay won at 3:35.61 with Emma Carlton (53.41), Kylie Powers (1:00.91), Jing Quah (52.80) and Chloe Stepanek (48.49) while the men won at 3:06.21 with Shaine Casas (44.25), Andres Puente Bustamante (52.15), Jace Brown (47.45) and Mark Theall (42.36).
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