FREDONIA, NY – The Penn State Behrend men's swimming and diving team won three of the seven events on the first day of the Fredonia Blue Devil Invitational on Friday night.
The Lions accumulated 292 points on opening day to sit in first place out of nine teams. Pitt-Bradford is second with 137.5 points and Allegheny is third with 135.
Behrend had the fastest 400 medley relay thanks to Mark Patterson (North Huntingdon, PA/Norwin), Noah Babik (Penn Township, PA/Penn Trafford), Steven Owens (Erie, PA/McDowell) and Michael Bauer (Northampton, PA/Northampton), touching in 3:32.54 for first.
The second relay of the day also won. Patterson, Brady Mattson (Wilmington, DE/Delaware Military Academy, Jacob Schmidt (Erie, PA/Cathedral Prep), and Cole Dombrosky (Mount Pleasant, PA/Mount Pleasant) were the winning four in the 800 freestyle relay in 7:11.14.
The Lions had the four top times and five of the top eight in the preliminaries in the 500 freestyle led by Patterson. The junior won the event with a time of 4:46.30. Mattson was second in the same event with a personal-record time of 4:47.70.
David Ewing (South Fayette, PA/South Fayette) was third with a PR time of 4:51.22, followed by Schmidt in fifth (4:56.97) and Dombrosky in sixth (4:57.48).
Ryan Siggins (Erie, PA/Iroquois) won the "B" final of the 500 freestyle in 5:00.75.
Ryan Elsey (Hermitage, PA/Hickory) grabbed the final spot in the prelims in the 200 IM to be able to complete in the finals. He ended up in the same spot, eighth, in the finals with a time of 2:03.53.
Bauer was edged by .13 seconds in the 50 free for second in the prelims. Quinn Fischer (Fairview, PA/Cathedral Prep) and Alex Croll (Honolulu, HI/Roosevelt)also advanced to the finals for Behrend. Bauer finished runner up in 21.69, while Fischer took fifth (22.05) and Croll followed in sixth (22.29).
Behrend returns to action tomorrow for day two of the invitational.