ERIE, Pa. – The Penn State Behrend men's swimming and diving team captured their 11th straight Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference (AMCC) Championship in front of a home crowd on Saturday night in the Junker Pool.
The Lions, who held a substantial lead heading into the final day of competition, won four of the seven events tonight to remain out in front for the AMCC crown. Behrend finished 363 points ahead of second-place Alfred State with 763 points. Pitt-Bradford was seven points off the Pioneers with 393 for third and Penn State Altoona came in fourth (270). Cabrini rounded out the five teams with 260 points.
Sophomore Mark Patterson (North Huntingdon, PA/Norwin) and senior Nick Kost (Ashburn, VA/Stone Bridge) were tied for the highest-point winner of the meet for the Lions. Patterson, Kost, Nick Roth (Pittsburgh, PA/Baldwin), and Ryan Siggins (Erie, PA/Iroquois) each won an individual event and led the Lions in the 400 free relay. Patterson set a new pool record on his way to a first-place finish in the 200 backstroke to repeat as champion with a winning time of 1:50.94.
Roth beat his winning time from last year in the 200 butterfly with a new team, pool, AMCC meet and AMCC open record of 1:53.91. This marks the fourth straight year Roth was an AMCC Champion in the 200 butterfly.
Kost won the AMCC title for the first time in the 200 breaststroke, setting a new team and pool record in 2:09.07. Ryan Elsey (Hermitage, PA/Hickory) improved his prelims time by 4.75 to place second overall in 2:13.59.
What proves to be a very tight race each year, Siggins managed to touch first with a time of 49.21 to claim gold in the 100 freestyle. Quinn Fischer (Fairview, PA/Cathedral Prep) was .19 seconds behind for third place (49.40) and Justin Spence (Houston, TX/Cy-Fair) set a personal record with a time of 50.15 for fourth.
Freshman Brady Mattson (Wilmington, DE/Delaware Military Academy) picked up his first conference title by winning the 1650 freestyle with a personal-best time of 17:21.38 and dropping 9.37 seconds from his seeding. In fifth place was Mike Geary (Erie, PA/Mercyhurst) in 18:22.98.
Patterson, Kost, Siggins, and Roth joined forces for the winning 400 freestyle relay. The foursome tallied a time of 3:10.84 for the final win of the night. Kost and Roth repeated as champions in this event.
Ethan Halmi (Erie, PA/McDowell) earned his second runner-up medal in the one-meter diving. The senior tallied a score of 201.80 for six dives.
Since the beginning of the AMCC swimming and diving championships in 2007, the Lions have never surrendered a title.
