March 27, 2009
Texas A&M sophomore Boris Loncaric (pronounced LON-char-itch) took down the oldest record in the Aggie men's swimming and diving record book in Friday's morning session at the NCAA Championships.
Loncaric, from Zagreb, Croatia, earned a spot in tonight's Championship final with a huge lifetime best effort of 45.53 in the preliminary heats of the 100-yard butterfly. Loncaric's swim bettered the school standard of 47.10 that was set two-time NCAA runner-up Chris O'Neil in 1986. Loncaric's lifetime best coming in the NCAA meet was 47.26 from the 2009 Big 12 Championships.
Loncaric enters the Championship final as the No. 7 qualifier and will face Auburn's Tyler McGill and Logan Madson, Stanford's Austin Staab and Jason Dunsford, Michigan's Chris Brady, Texas' Hill Taylor and Princeton's Doug Lennox in the final.
The Aggies tallied another school record in the morning session with the 200-yard medley relay earning a spot in the consolation final with a time of 1:25.51. The foursome of junior Jason Bergstrom, junior Casey Strange broke their own school record of 1:25.61 that they had set earlier this month at the Austin Grand Prix.
In other preliminary action, Lavery was 29th in the 100 breaststroke qualifying with a time of 54.26, while Bergstrom was 26th in the 100 backstroke with a time of 47.38.
In preliminary diving action, the Aggies put a pair of divers into the Championship final of the three-meter springboard. Senior Eric Sehn was the No. 3 qualifier with a score of 411.05 and freshman Grant Nel was the last diver into the final with a 392.30 point total. It is the second time in school history that A&M has put multiple competitors into a Championship final and the first time it's happened since Sehn and David Kalec placed fifth and eighth on the tower at the 2005 NCAA meet.