For the first time in 37 years, Saddleback College captured a conference title in men's swimming when the team won the Orange Empire Conference championship on Friday night at Orange Coast College.
The men's program at Saddleback hadn't won a conference title since 1984 when they captured the Mission Conference title under legendary coach Flip Darr. The wait is over as the men ran away with the title on Friday night by a big margin. Saddleback finished with 515 points, beating second place Golden West (428) by 87 points. Orange Coast finished in third place (279) with Cypress College in fourth (256) and Fullerton College fifth (219).
With 28 swimmers for the finals, Saddleback used strength in numbers to capture the title. The swim team had a number of tremendous efforts, led by Carson Williams and Roland Mantecon. Williams was responsible for scoring 46 points on his own, finishing second in the 100-yard backstroke (56.57), third in the 50-yard freestyle (22.16) and sixth in the 100-yard freestyle (49.31). Mantecon was right on his heels with 45 total points, finishing second in the 200-yard freestyle (1:46.67) and fifth in both the 100-yard freestyle (49.04) and 500-yard freestyle (5:06.76).
Saddleback had nine swimmers with 20-or-more points. Ivan Moilanen had 32 points on the strength of a third place finish in the 100-yard backstroke (58.22). Alec Abrahamian and Yughe Bista both finished with 30 points. Nathan James had 29 points, bolstered by a third place finish in the 100-yard breaststroke (1:01.48).
The Saddleback squad off the night with a second place finish in the 400-yatrd freestyle relay, shaving 10 seconds off of its qualifying time.
In other news, one of the great performances in OEC history was pulled off in the 100 Fly when Orange Coast swimmer Luke Venzlaff broke the meet record in a time of 48.95.
TOP-5 PERFORMANCES:
200 Medley Relay
1. OCC 1:36.37
2. CC 1:38.20
3. GWC 1:42.41
4. FC 1:42.64
5. SC 1:44.25
200 Freestyle Relay
1. OCC 1:28.21
2. GWC 1:29.24
3. SC 1:30.68
4. FC 1:34.47
400 Freestyle Relay
1. OCC 3:13.17
2. SC 3:15.36
3. CC 3:16.09
4. GWC 3:22.76
5. FC 3:30.04
200 Freestyle
1. Ethan Umpornpickdi CC 1:45.11
2. Roland Mantecon SC 1:46.67
3. Ian Diamond GWC 1:49.89
4. Riley Pfieffer GWC 1:51.60
5. Mack Woolery SC 1:52.13
200 Individual Medley
1. Garrett Long FC 2:02.10
2. Marcus Dalija GWC 2:04.19
3. Jakob Otte OCC 2:04.27
4. Barnabas Vidovics GWC 2:05.47
5. Ivan Moilanen SC 2:09.53
50 Freestyle
1. Zachary Sofai CC 21.02
2. Rylan Lantz GWC 21.45
3. Carson Williams SC 22.16
4. Joshua Boynton CC 22.36
5. Riley Kratz SC 22.58
100 Fly
1. Luke Venzlaff OCC 48.95 * (meet record)
2. Jonathan Villa FC 53.69
3. Matthew Ray OCC 55.44
4. Nathan Ciolek CC 55.80
5. Dylan Honrath GWC 55.85
100 Freestyle
1. Zachary Sofai CC 47.00
2. Arnaud Parmentier OCC 47.09
3. Dane Howell OCC 48.46
4. Joshua Boynton CC 48.67
5. Roland Mantecon SC 49.04
500 Freestyle
1. Ethan Umpornpuckdi CC 4:41.20
2. Jonathan Villa FC 5:01.99
3. Dylan Honrath GWC 5:03.17
4. Ian Diamond GWC 5:03.20
5. Roland Mantecon SC 5:06.76
100 Backstroke
1. Arnaud Parmentier OCC 54.41
2. Carson Williams SC 56.57
3. Ivan Loilanen SC 58.22
4. Rylan Lantz GWC 58.40
5. Dylan Honrath GWC 59.23
100 Breaststroke
1. Jakob Otte OCC 1:00.17
2. Marcus Dalija GWC 1:00.81
3. Nathan James SC 1:01.40
4. Garrett Long FC 1:02.03
5. Ramy Bishay SC 1:03.35