Nov. 23, 2013
BLACKSBURG, Va. – With the finals still yet to be swam in the night session, redshirt freshman Kevin Leithold produced South Carolina’s biggest result of the day in the prelims of the 100 breaststroke as he set the recorded the nation’s top time at 53.57 while breaking the school’s seven-year-old record in the process.
The Gamecocks went on to pick up six more NCAA B cut times on the day.
“It was probably one of our best combined days as a program,” head swimming and diving coach McGee Moody said. “We swam fast today and had some huge achievements as a program. We have one more day left and we have to be sharp and we have to go race hard, then we can sit back and kind of enjoy the weekend.”
In the women’s 400 IM, Carolina went 1-2-3-5 behind the efforts of Victoria Mitchell, Abby Galbreath, Rachel Schaffer and Megan Carlson. Mitchell and Galbreath clocked in with B cut times of 4:17.20 and 4:17.32, respectively.
Later in the meet, Leithold earned his second B cut time of the day as he finished second in the 100 freestyle, lowering his prelim time down to 47.73. Sam Lynch finished two spots back of his teammate at 48.39.
In the men’s 200 freestyle, Michael Flach and Gerard Rodriguez finished third and fifth, respectively, while both earned B cut times. Flach finished in 1:37.30, while Rodriguez came in at 1:37.62.
In the relays, the Gamecock men finished first and fourth in the 200 medley. The team of Leithold, Lynch, Jay Warner and Eric Lethander won the event with a time of 1:27.95, which ranks fourth nationally this season. The time was also third in school history. Michael Covert, Jared Kauffman, Robert Gilchrist and Joshua Clothier were under four seconds behind their teammates at 1:31.40.
Leithold, Gilchrist, Rodriguez and Flach teamed up in the 800 freestyle relay to record the third-fastest time in the country at 6:33.29.
The invitational will continue Saturday morning at 10 a.m., with the prelims of the women’s 200 backstroke.
