New Paltz, NY — The State University of New York at New Paltz swimming team showed up confident to compete against Vassar College Friday, but wasn't able to secure a win, losing on the women's side, 163-94, and the men's side, 143-117.
 
"We love competing against Vassar. They're the closest rival we have distance-wise and there's a pretty long dual meet tradition between the two of us just because of how close we are geographically," said Hawks coach Tom Eickelberg. "It's always kind of fun to rub noses with them." 
 
SUNY New Paltz was victorious against the Brewers in the previous season, but wasn't able to continue the success. Although the Hawks suffered losses on both the women and men's sides, the they were pleased with their ability to compete in the face of a superior rival.
 
"It was one of the more fun dual meets we've had with them. I had this expectation: I thought we were going to have a tough meet, I thought we were going to get beaten pretty badly, but New Paltz really showed up," said Eickelberg. "We have a small roster. We've got a lot of people in off-events today because I wanted them to have the opportunity to race different things and have a different experience than they usually do. We did a really good job of putting our best foot forward, winning events, touching out close races to make this meet a lot closer than it should have been on paper."
 
SUNY New Paltz had multiple stand-out events throughout the competition, beginning with the women's 200-yard medley relay. Junior Chelsea Angulas, sophomore Lindsay Kranitz, and seniors Katie Donlevy and Nicole Lee touched out Vassar College by a tenth of a second for a time of 1 minute, 52 seconds. Angulas enjoyed an individual win in the 100-yard backstroke (1:01.10) and Donlevy finished first in the 100-yard freestyle (56.38).
 
The women had an exciting 50-yard freestyle; Lee finished second just a hundredth of a second behind a Brewers swimmer (26.17). Junior Sarah Crespo followed shortly for third (26.58) and senior Degen Mariniello finished for fifth (28.56).
 
Freshman Ethan Bonney claimed the men's first individual win in the 1,650-yard freestyle (17:15.24), followed by senior Barrett Celecki for a fourth place finish (17:59.65). The meet was Celecki's first of the year after finishing his final season as a Hawks cross country runner. Senior Yaya Toure finished first in the 100-yard backstroke (58.70).
 
Freshman Nolan West and sophomore Jared Finn secured the top two finishes in the 50-yard freestyle with times of 22.76 and 23.01, respectively. The duo was back for the top two finishes in the 100-yard freestyle, as Finn finished with a 49.91 and West with a 49.96.
Although SUNY New Paltz knew by the last event that its efforts to win were futile, it still put in the work for an exciting finish. Finn, West, senior Matthew Kessler and freshman Mitchell Chappell won the 400-yard freestyle relay with a time of 3:18.03, which was more than four seconds faster than the Brewers' second place relay.
 
"I was really happy with the way the athletes represented the school, the volume of the meet, the way we completed and had some really nice relay wins, some really nice individual wins, including a really nice culminating effort in that 400 free relay," said Eickelberg. "Hopefully we can continue the good work and bring it on for another really good athletic challenge tomorrow at Hamilton."
 
SUNY New Paltz will travel to Clinton, NY Saturday to compete against Hamilton College at 1 p.m. For everything #NPHawks including photos, video, recaps and highlights, be sure to follow @nphawks on Twitter and @newpaltzhawks on Facebook and Instagram.