The Miami Hurricanes swimming and diving team had a successful ACC Championship appearance in Atlanta last week, with senior diver Zach Cooper taking home his second consecutive gold medal and the team setting a new school record in the 400-yard medley relay.
Cooper defended his conference title and picked up his fifth career medal, with two of them being gold and the other three being silver. Sophomore diver Max Flory took home a bronze medal, finishing behind Cooper and bringing the Canes to seven medals in four days.
Miami’s 400-yard medley relay team of senior Carmen San Nicolas, redshirt junior Zorry Mason, redshirt senior Danika Huizinga and sophomore Emma Sunstrand set a school record with a time of 3:37.27, breaking a record that had been set earlier in the season.
“I don’t really know where to start,” Miami head swimming coach Andy Kershaw said. “That was fun. Obviously not a perfect week, no competition is – but our girls, they rose to the occasion in a lot of cases and battled it out. The way it came down to the last free relay for our finish, they’ve earned experiences like that through all their sacrifices. It ended a great with the 400-medley relay record, which we had set earlier in the year. To re-break [the record] it was great.”
The medley relay was not the only record UM broke, as the 400-yard freestyle relay team set a school record with a 3:18.28 time. The team was made up of San Nicolas, freshman Jacey Hinton, redshirt sophomore Adrianna Cera, and senior Sydney Knapp.
The weekend at the McAuley Aquatic Center ended on a high note for the Canes, as Flory was named the ACC Championships Men’s Diving MVP. Flory captured a gold medal, as well as the bronze.
“To have Carmen leading off that last relay and [Knapp] on the end, for that to be how they end their swimming career as Hurricanes, it’s the stuff that they make movies out of,” Kershaw said. “The culture that these women are building and the things that they’re doing and the trajectory they have, it’s great.”
Miami is back in Coral Gables before traveling to Athens, Georgia, Friday for the Bulldog Invitational this weekend.