Tar Heel Men Finish Up Competition at ACC Championships

Saturday, March 2

Greensboro, N.C.

All Day

North Carolina

ACC Championships (Men's Swimming)

Photo by: Baird Photography

March 2, 2019 | Swimming & Diving

Complete Results

GREENSBORO, N.C. — The North Carolina men's swimming and diving program wrapped up competition at the 2019 ACC Championships on Saturday with a total score of 388.5 points for 10th place.

"We wish we had placed higher as a team, but we had a great week," head coach Rich DeSelm said. "We knew we were thin and we tried our best to step up and swim for each other and for UNC. We tried to have a great time and stay positive, and we had a lot of great things happen. There were a lot of lifetime-best times, people making finals. The men treasured every opportunity they got to put up some points. Our seniors — Tom Bilden, Sean Burston, Noah Cairns, Patrick Cusick, Nick Loomis and Austin Sellers — have been invaluable with their experience and leadership. Some of our top-talent is in some of the younger classes so hopefully that bodes well for the future. I hope the younger competitors got a lot of experience and feel more comfortable at this level in a fast-improving and very, very competitive conference. I hope our guys that return to the team next year will learn from this meet, grow from it and be more competitive next year."

Though the team finish was not what Carolina had hoped for, a number of student-athletes qualified for evening finals and many had lifetime-best performances at the conference face-off. The Tar Heels combined for 25 new career records across 10 individual events and nine swimmers made 14 finals appearances. All but two swims were season-best performances.

On day three, sophomore Valdas Abaliksta and freshman Sterling Smith qualified for the 100-yard breaststroke championship A final and each swam top-10 times in UNC history. Abaliksta ranks third all-time after setting personal bests in both the prelims (53.03) and the final (52.92) and Smith moved up to the fourth spot with his prelim time of 53.08.

Sophomore Alvin Jiang also had a number of noteworthy swims, qualifying for consolation B finals and finishing 12th overall in both of his primary events — the 100-yard backstroke and the 100-yard butterfly. Jiang swam the third-fastest 100 fly in school history of 46.22.

Sophomore Eli Coan stepped up in his first year with the Tar Heels after transferring from Gardner-Webb University after his freshman season. In his first ACC Championships, Coan swam the fifth-best 50 free time in UNC history (19.75) to qualify for the consolation final. The native also swam into the Carolina record books in the 100-yard freestyle, clocking 43.76 in the prelims for the sixth-fastest time by a Tar Heel and 44.09 in the final for 23rd overall.

Prior to the swimming portion of the men's ACC Championships, the Carolina divers also made significant contributions to the team's score. Senior diver Sean Burston finished fifth overall in the men's one-meter competitions with a season-best finals score of 346.90 and junior Bryan Allen qualified for the men's platform diving final in which he placed sixth with a score of 321.15.

UP NEXT: The North Carolina swimming and diving teams host their women's last chance meet on Sunday, March 3 and the men's last chance meet on Sunday, March 10. The women's competition kicks off Sunday with prelims at 10 a.m. and finals at 5 p.m.