Aggies down SMU in final SEC Championships tune-up

Friday, January 29

College Station

7:00 PM

Texas A&M

143

SMU

Jan 29, 2016 | Men's Swimming and Diving

COLLEGE STATION, Texas. – The Texas A&M men's swimming and diving team downed longtime rival SMU 143-98 on Friday in the team's final swimming tune-up before the Southeastern Conference Championships.

With the win on Senior Night, the Aggies closed out the dual meet portion of their 2015-16 season with a 7-1 record, which is most wins and highest winning percentage of the Jay Holmes era (2004-05-present). The Aggies can now set their focus on the SEC Championships, which will be contested Feb. 16-20 in Columbia, Mo.

"It's always a great feeling to get a victory over a rival like SMU, but we know we have to get a lot done of the next two week to get ready for the SEC Championships," said Holmes, who improved to 7-5 against the Ponies. "There are simply no bad teams in the SEC and you have to fight and claw for every point. This team did a great job of competing throughout the dual meet season, but now they need to take it up a notch for the Championship season."

Against the Mustangs, the Aggies won eight of 13 possible events, including both relays. A&M opened the meet by going 1-2 in the 400-yard medley relay with the foursome of sophomore Brock Bonetti, sophomore Mauro Castillo, junior Turker Ayar and junior Jacob Gonzales touching in 3:11.70. The Aggies closed the meet with the group of Gonzales, senior Antoine Marc, Bonetti and Ayar winning the 400 free relay in 2:57.50.

Individually, Castillo stole the show by dominating the field in the 200-yard breaststroke while lowering his own school record in the race with a time of 1:54.97. Right behind him was sophomore teammate Jonathan Tybur in 2:00.91.

"In the fall Mauro told us he was going to break his record in the 200 and to not bother replacing the placard on the record board because he was going to break it again, and that's exactly what he's done," Holmes said. "He just keeps getting better and I think he's got a good chance of breaking it again at SECs and NCAAs."

One of the tightest battles of the night was the duel between Aggie freshman diver Sam Thornton and SMU sophomore standout Bryce Klein. Klein edged out Thornton by just 1.75 points in the one-meter dive, 407.25-405.00, but Thornton returned the favor by winning the three-meter springboard over Klein, 399.08-384.61. Aggie junior Colton Haffey placed third on both boards with a 298.13 total on the one-meter and 299.70 on the three-meter.

The Aggies took the top four spots in the 200 IM with sophomore transfer Austin Van Overdam grabbing first in 1:47.72, followed by Marc (1:48.72), freshman Mateo Gonzalez (1:49.15) and Tybur (1:51.89).

Freshman Angel Martinez led a 1-2-3 Aggie finish in the 200 butterfly with a winning time of 1:46.19. He was trailed by Gonzalez (1:49.07) and Van Overdam (1:49.25).

Ayar and sophomore Justin Morey grabbed the top two spots in the 100 free with Ayar winning in 44.29 and Morey touching in 44.59.

Bonetti outclassed the field with a nearly five-second victory in the 200 backstroke in a time of 1:42.93, which was just off his own school record of 1:42.11 from last year's SEC Championships. Grabbing runner-up honors was senior Alexandros Theocharidis in 1:47.54 and junior Juan Rocha was third in 1:48.06.

Prior to the swimming and diving action, the Aggies' Senior Class of 2016 was honored: Hunter Funk, Mitch Glander, Antoine Marc, Mateo Muzek, Alexandros Theocharidis and Jacob Wallace.