Cedar Rapids, IA – The Scarlet Hawks finished their season with impressive swims on Saturday evening as the men finished in fourth place overall at the 2015 Liberal Arts Conference Championships. Nine total teams competed at the meet.
Heading into the final session, the Scarlet Hawks were in a tight race with Morningside College and Luther College for second place. Heading into the final session, the men were just 13 points behind Morningside for third place and only 29.5 points behind Luther for second. Illinois Tech finished the four-day meet in fourth place with 436 points. Morningside finished in third with 470 points and Luther College finished in second with 477.5 points. Fifth place team, Loras College, was back at 226 points. The fourth place finish is an improvement from the 2014 championships where the team finished in fifth at just 300 points. Defending champions, Franklin College won the meet with a total of 785.5 points.
In the final session, Junior Kevin Boldt got things started with a runner-up finish in the 1650 Freestyle with a lifetime-best time of 16:48.50. Michael Dobben, Tristan Busch and Ben Callan also earned points in the 1650 Freestyle as they finished 13th, 14th and 15th respectively. Dobben finished with a final time of 18:08.30, Buschwith a lifetime-best 18:22.35 and Callan also with a lifetime-best of 18:47.69.
Ray Mohaimani and Joe Valio both finished in the top eight in the 200 Backstroke with fifth place and seventh place finishes respectively. Mohaimani finished with a season-best time of 1:57.83 and Valio finished with a lifetime-best time of 2:03.61 (2:02.45 in preliminaries). Luke Workman then joined in on the action with a 10th place finish in the 100 Freestyle, posting a season-best final time of 48.92.
The impressive swims continued with Jay Korhonen and Billy Bafia in the 200 Breaststroke. Korhonen finished fifth with a season-best time of 2:11.51 and Bafia finished third with a lifetime-best time of 2:10.16. The 200 Butterfly was the final individual event of Saturday's session and Juniors Matt Williams and Tanner Grieve both posted great swims. Williams made his first appearance in a final session at Conference and finished 15th overall with a lifetime-best time of 2:11.25. Grieve entered finals with the top seed in the event with his lifetime-best swim coming in the preliminary session at 1:58.51. In perhaps the most exciting race of the evening, Grieve was out-touched by Bailey Wiloughby (1:59.53) and finished as the runner-up with a time of 1:59.65.
The men concluded the four-day meet with a sixth place finish in the 400 Freestyle Relay. Workman, Boldt, Mohaimani and Bafia finished the race with a final time of 3:16.15.
The Scarlet Hawks enter the off-season graduating only two seniors, Bafia and Mohaimani. Twelve swimmers will return for the 2015-16 season. Nine returning Scarlet Hawks scored at the 2015 championship meet.
To stay up-to-date with the Scarlet Hawks during the off-season, follow them on social media on Facebook (www.facebook.com/IllinoisTechSwimming), Twitter(@IITSwim) and Instagram (@IITSwimming).