Cortland, NY — State University of New York at New Paltz swimming coach Tom Eicklberg was eager to kick off the season at the Cortland Pumpkin Relays Saturday. Partly because the Hawks are primed to improve on their strong second place finishes at last year's SUNYAC meet, and partly because the second-year coach was looking forward in facing his old team, the Red Dragons.
 
"It was great to be back in my former home with my current team," said Eickelberg, who spent three seasons as a graduate assist at SUNY Cortland. "Really special to watch the Hawks swim, and win, on the deck that made me fall in love with coaching."
 
Eickelberg was happy with the way his team performed in their opening weekend. Both the men's and women's teams placed third overall with 586 and 548 points, respectively.
 
SUNY Cortland placed first on both sides with the its men's team totaling 754 points and women recording 770.
 
On the men's side, Nazareth College placed second with 668 points, followed by the Hawks, Marywood College (504), Wells College (216) and Roberts Weslyeyan (190). 
 
The Golden Flyers of Nazareth came in second on the women's side after totaling 684 points, followed by SUNY New Paltz, the Pacers of Marywood (240) and the Express of Wells (184).
 
The Hawks placed first in two events on the men's side and two on the women's, while totaling eight combined second place finishes.
 
Cooper Knapp, Chad Plante, Caleb Treadwell and Kevin Sales helped SUNY New Paltz to its first win of the day, clocking in at 1 minute, 38.79 seconds in the 200-yard medley relay. Nazareth College touched just .07 seconds behind the Hawks to place second, followed by Cortland (1:41.45), Marywood University (1:43.47) and Wells College (2:05.72).
 
SUNY New Paltz cruised to a first-place finish in the men's 8x25-yard freestyle relay, clocking in at 1:26.72. Knapp anchored the win alongside teammates Thomas Barnitkowski, Colin Duell and Joe Galante. Marywood and Nazarath followed with times of 1:34.34 and 1:44.09, respectively.
 
Along with its top finishes, the Hawks placed second in the 3x100 breaststroke (3:16.54), 3x100 butterfly (2:46.69), 200 freestyle relay (1:30.63), behind the Golden Flyers (3:14.82, 2:40.25, 1:29.16, respectively), and the 3x100 medley relay (2:57.89), behind the Red Dragons (2:53.90).
 
"Our men did a great job despite a really small roster this weekend," Eicklberg said. "Standouts on the men's side came from the 200 medley and freestyle relays, and some great individual medley splits."
 
Jaimie Kaefer, Katie Donlevy and Megan Joseph gave SUNY New Paltz is first first-place finish on the women's side, clocking in at 3:17.22 to beat Nazareth (3:18.39), Cortland (3:19.28), Marywood (3:28.78) and Roberts Weslyeyan (4:10.39), respectively, in the 3x100 medley relay.
 
Chelsea Angulas, Katherine Cavanaugh, Samantha Conforti, Sarah Crespo touched first in the 8x25 freestyle relay with a time of 1:40.11.
 
The Hawks also came in second in the women's 500 freestyle (4:50.82), 3x100 backstroke (3:09.73) and 200-freestyle relay (1:45.64).
 
"Strong women's meet, really happy with how we committed to finishing races despite our workload," Eicklberg said. "Standout performances came from our women's 3x100 IM relay and both of the medley relays. Our freshmen did a great job on both sides, and represented the program really well."
 
The Hawks are back in action Oct. 28 when they travel to Oneonta to take on Hartwick College at Moyer Pool for a 1 p.m. meet.
 
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