It was a monumental week for the NYU swimming and diving teams, as they traveled to the UAA Championships in Webster, New York. The meet included 12 different contests taking place over four days, from early Wednesday through Saturday night. At the end of it all, the Violet men took third and the women’s team took fourth out of the eight teams in the conference. Emory University’s men’s and women’s teams emerged victorious for the 18th consecutive year.

There was only one event on Wednesday — the women’s one-meter competition. Two Violets made it past prelims, with junior Ashlie Pankonin placing third and sophomore Austin Campitelli coming in sixth.

Thursday was a very successful day for sophomore Joe Baron. He finished third in the 50-yard freestyle before leading NYU to fourth in the 200-yard relay. A number of men qualified for the NCAA finals, including junior Max Phillips in the 550-yard freestyle, sophomore Tim Kou in the 200 yard IM and a team of Kou, junior captain Daniel Tay and senior Win Htet Oo in the 400-yard medley relay.

The women fared equally well. Three swimmers — sophomore Isabelle Kitze, junior captain Elise Gibbs and sophomore Serena Yan — finished in the top eight in the 50-yard freestyle. Kitze’s third place performance earned her an NCAA qualification. Sophomore Rachel Munger finished ninth in the 200-yard IM with an NCAA qualifying time. The 200-yard freestyle relay team of Gibbs, Yan, freshman Sarah Stone and senior captain Krista Traub came in second and qualified for the NCAA championships.

On Friday two NYU men won events. Phillips was champion in the 200-yard freestyle, breaking an NYU record with a time of 1:39.04. Sophomore Chad Moody won the 100-yard backstroke. Both of these results produced NCAA qualifications. In the 400-yard IM freshman Reid Hansen and sophomore Tim Kwarcincski came in third and fourth respectively, each earning an NCAA spot.

For the women, freshman May Li took third place in the 100-yard backstroke. The 200-yard medley team, made up of Li, Gibbs, Traub and Kitze finished in fourth. Kitze qualified for the NCAA championships with a fifth place finish in the 100-yard butterfly. Campitelli finished third in the three-meter dive.

NYU finished the competition strong on Saturday. Kou finished second in the 200-yard breaststroke. He was also part of a fourth place 400-yard relay team alongside Moody, Baron and Oo. Kou will be heading to the NCAA championships as an individual and a part of the relay team, but reaching there wasn’t easy.

“I felt a little tired in prelims and faced some tough competition that morning, but barely managed to sneak into finals and performed better that night,” Kou said.

Kitze took fifth in the 100-yard freestyle and led the women — along with Traub, Hannah Berg and Noel Leung — to fourth in the 400-yard freestyle.

All of the NCAA-qualifiers will be competing at the NCAA Championships in Greensboro, North Carolina from
March 16-19.

A version of this article appeared in the Feb. 22 print edition. Email Tony Schwab at [email protected].