Sargent leads Pack to sweep of Blue Devils

Alec Sawyer, Assistant Sports Editor • October 21, 2018

Members of the men’s swimming team jump off the starting blocks for the hypoxic challenge, a 50-yard underwater kick. This was one of many events held at the fourth annual Wolfpack Games held on Friday, Sept. 28 In the Casey Aquatic Center.

For the second straight weekend to open the season, the NC State swimming and diving team picked up two big victories. The No. 4 Wolfpack men beat Duke 198-102 at the Taishoff Aquatics Pavilion on Saturday, Oct. 20, while the No. 11 Pack women won 196-104.

The Wolfpack finished with the top time in 26 of the 28 swimming events, with the men winning 13 of 14 and the women winning 13 of 14. NC State also had nine events in which it swept the top three positions, five for the men and four for the women.

NC State utilized most of its roster against the Blue Devils, as 16 different swimmers won events and 32 different Wolfpack student-athletes finished in the top three spots of an event. While most of the Pack participated, a few athletes took the meet off, most notably Andreas Vazaios.

Junior Makayla Sargent led the way for NC State, finishing in first place in three different events. Sargent won a tightly contested 500-yard freestyle race by less than two seconds and also picked up wins in the 200-yard butterfly and 400-yard individual medley.

Story continues below advertisement

Four Wolfpack swimmers won two events on the afternoon. Sophomore Jack McIntyre took first place in the 1,000-yard freestyle and 400 IM, as well as placing second in the 500 free. Senior Jacob Molacek won both the 100- and 200-yard freestyle. Junior Ky-Lee Perry swept the sprint freestyle events on the women’s side, winning the 100- and 50-yard freestyle.

Freshman Sophie Hansson had an impressive showing as well, winning the 100- and 200-yard breaststroke events. Hansson wasn’t the only freshman who had a strong meet. Freshman Emma Muzzy won the 200-yard backstroke, finished second in the 400 IM and third in the 100-yard backstroke.

Freshman Nyls Korstanje won the 50-yard freestyle for the men for the second week in a row. A number of other Wolfpack swimmers had strong meets as well, with the Pack filling up the leaderboards with fast times for this early in the season.

In diving, juniors James Brady and Madeline Kline were the best members of the Wolfpack. Kline and Brady both finished third in both the 1-meter dive and the 3-meter dive. Duke’s Evan Moretti swept the men’s diving events, while the Devils’ Maddison Pullinger and Mack Willborn split the women’s dives.

The Wolfpack will take a few weeks off before returning to competition, when it will head to Purdue for the ACC/Big Ten Challenge on Nov. 10-11.