GRINNELL, Iowa -- The Augustana Vikings men's and women's swimming & diving teams enjoyed a successful trip to the two-day Grinnell Invitational, with the men finishing in second out of six teams and the women in third out of seven. Both the men and women finished with the most team points at this meet in the long history they have been attending.

The Vikings benefited from great depth on both sides, securing multiple high placements to help contribute to the team scores. Head coach Dan Lloyd contributes their success this weekend to the contributions from top to bottom on the team.

"I am so proud of our team," Lloyd stated. "Our entire team stepped up and did their job and showed a lot of toughness and heart in our races. We still have work to do as we prepare for conference championships in February, but this was a great step forward as the job is not done."

On the men's side, the Vikings earned multiple record-setting efforts throughout their two-day stay. On Friday the 200-freestyle relay team of Kacper Cebula, Tyler Leslie, Jack Blumenfeld, and Oskar Bannister finished the race with a time of 1:24.83, setting a new Grinnell Invitational record. It broke a 15-yard mark of 1:25.60 set in 2008. Also setting a pair of records on Friday was Mark Addison, who not only broke meet records in both the 200-breast and 500-free, but his 200-breaststroke time of 2:06.16 was also an Augustana record, breaking the previous time of 2:08:14 set by Ian Disteldorf in 2016. The meet record for this event was 2:06.87.

The Viking men continued to shatter records on Saturday. Nick Phillips, Cebula, Leslie, and Bannister completed the 200-medley relay in 1:33.53, breaking the previous school record of 1:33.56 set in 2016. Leslie also set a school and meet record in the 200-free with a time of 1:42.44. He breaks the previous Grinnell Invitational meet record time of 1:43.68 set in 2009 and the program record of 1:42.65 set by Blumenfeld in 2022. In the last race of the day, the 400-freestyle relay team of Leslie, Cebula, Blumenfeld, and Bannister set a new meet record with a time of 3:07.04. It breaks the previous record of 3:11.71 set in 2017, also by Augustana. Leslie also was the individual winner in the 200-yard IM to add to his success this weekend.

The men ended the meet with 1,123 points, second only to host Grinnell.

For the women, Olivia White highlighted a great weekend for the Vikings, winning the 500-freestyle with a time of 5:20.27 to earn 24 points for the team. She was also a part of a second-place 200-yard freestyle relay team and finished third in the 200-yard freestyle race. Brooke Walker was the event winner in the 1650-yard freestyle, clocking 18:34.50, nearly two seconds faster than the second-place finisher. In the 100-yard backstroke, Hailey Glasnovich placed third with a time of 1:01.14, while Bella Casanovas earned third in the 200-fly with a final time of 2:19.37. 

The women earned 727 points to conclude the meet, 140 more than fourth-place Luther. 

Augustana is back in action on Friday, January 27 for a dual meet at St. Ambrose. Start time is scheduled for 6:00 p.m.