Sioux City, IA - On Nov 11^th and 12^th the Lakers traveled down to Sioux City to compete in the Mustang Invite, an annual meet hosted by Morningside University, that the Laker swim and dive program has participated in since 2012. This meet is especially exciting  for the Lakers since it is the first meet in their season that offers a full meet lineup (as opposed to a short format dual meet), so the Lakers have an opportunity to swim all of their primary events. The Lakers took full advantage of this opportunity and made a big splash against the other participating schools. The Men's team had some stand-out racing, including Sophomore Eduardo Martiniano, who led the men's team with 2 overall first-place finishes, on the way to the Men's team outscoring their 2021 performance (where they placed 5/5 overall) by 200 points for a 2^nd place overall team finish.

Women's Highlights:

• Sophomore Allison Graff led the Lakers with a 4^th place finish in the 100 IM (1:12.33), a fun event the Lakers don't often get to race. Rylee Valentine raced her way into 6^th in the event with a time of 1:22.59)
• Allison Graff worked her way into another top finish, this time in the 100 back where she earned 5th (1:12.49), followed by teammate Rylee Valentine who hung on for a 6^th place finish in the same event (1:20.56), narrowly out touching a swimmer from the University of Saint Mary.
• Graff and Valentine both cracked the top 8 in the fastest swimming event, the 50 free, Graff touched in 28.26 for 6^th and Valentine touched 8^th (30.74)

Men's Highlights:

• Eduardo Martiniano and Rhys Cheer highlighted the 500 free to open the meet, with Martiniano placing 5^th (5:16.22) and Cheer finishing 8^th (5:20.13)
• The 200 IM was an excited event to watch as Marcelo Rojas raced his way to 3^rd in the 200 IM (1:58.39), Andres 7^th (2:10.01) and Eduardo 8^th (2:10.25)
• Eduardo Martiniano and Patrick Voller represented the Laker men in the splash and dash, 50 freestyle. Martiniano touched for 3^rd in (21.90), and Voller held on to 9^th (22.78) overall.
• Rhys Cheer opened up the second day of the meet by racing the longest event offered in swimming, the 1650, placing 3^rd overall (19:09.26) scoring 12 points for the Laker Men. Cheer was joined by Erik Graff who placed 7^th (20:20.48) and Braeden Noel who was able to race his way into an 8^th overall finish (20:49.94)
• Marcelo Rojas showed his dominance in his primary event, the 400 IM, by placing 1^st (4:16.62), a full 20 seconds ahead of the next swimmer. Eduardo Sarmiento joined Rojas in the 400IM, swimming his way to a 4^th place finish (4:48.67), dropping 4 seconds from his previous year's performance in the event.
• The Lakers showed their strength in both the 100 and 200 breaststroke with multiple Lakers placing in both events. Andres Santana placed 2^nd in the 100 (1:01.02) and 3^rd in the 200 (2:22.05), while teammate Marcelo Rojas placed 3^rd in the 100 breast (1:02.21) and 2^nd in the 200 (2:13.64). Eduardo Sarmiento finished 5^th in the 100 (1:04.32) and 4^th in the 200 (2:27.69), fellow breaststroker Erik Graff placed 7^th in both the 100 (1:04.80) and 200 (2:28.78)
• Eduardo Martiniano placed 1^st in both the 100 free (47.61) and the 200 free (1:48.17), effectively completing a difficult sprint freestyle double win. In the 100, he was closely followed by teammate Patrick Voller who placed 8^th overall (51.03)
• The Lakers closed the meet out with an absolutely electrifying 4x100 free relay, finishing in a time of 3:15.09 missing first place (Iowa Central) by 0.17, both teams finished a full 6 seconds ahead of the other programs.

Up Next:

The Lakers head over to Sioux Falls to race at the Midco Aquatic Center. Augustana University will be hosting a 3-day Championship meet where 15 schools will race over the November 17-19^th weekend.