Last week, Utah sent one swimmer and two divers to the McAuley Aquatic Center in Atlanta, Georgia to compete at the men’s NCAA Championships. As the meet came to an end on Saturday, it concluded Utah’s 2015-2016 swim and dive season, with two Utah swimmers named as All-Americans.
“Good news is both Bence [Király] and Josiah [Purss] earned All-American status, which is fantastic,” said head coach Joe Dykstra. “You could never argue with how great that is, but otherwise, it was pretty rough. The divers were both battling through some severe injuries, and Bence was just having a tough meet.”
In his first night of competition, senior Király competed in the 500-yard freestyle, finishing 14th with a time of 4:16.74 in B-finals. As his meet continued, he finished 30th in the 200-yard freestyle (1:35.45) and 17th in the 1650-yard freestyle (15:01.79).
In diving, junior Purss competed in both the one- and three-meter events. In the one-meter, Purss managed to move on to finals, finishing 11th with a score of 365.60. To finish off his meet, he took 22nd in the three-meter with a 355.95, just above teammate senior Jacob Crayne.
“I was really proud of Jake [Crayne],” Dykstra said. “He didn’t earn All-American, but he competed after getting 10 stitches in the back of his head on Monday and competed 48-hours later.”
Even with his recent head injury, Crayne managed to place 46th in the one-meter event, finishing with a 295.20 score. As the meet went on though, Crayne really picked up the pace, placing 38th in the platform event (286.35) and 23rd in the three-meter (355.20).
“I am really proud of the guys we had here,” Dykstra said. “It’s been a really rough season for our men’s team and that continued on through this week, but we put a bow on this season and we are starting to look forward to next season.”
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