RIVERDALE, N.Y. - After Hurricane Sandy, a nor'easter, and technical malfunctions postponed the last two weeks of swimming, the Manhattan Jaspers finally returned to the pool on Friday when they hosted Baruch. The time off didn't prove too costly though as both squads came away with victories. The Manhattan women (2-2) defeated Baruch 103-99 while the men (3-1) came away with a 114-85 win at Riverdale Country Day School.
The women only had five top finishers in the 11 events but were able to rack up enough points using their depth. Kim Geissler took the first victory for Manhattan in the 1000 yard freestyle with a time of 12:05.41 seconds. She would later finish first in the 500 yard freestyle as well. Paige Raccioppi was also a double winner on the day taking both the 200 yard Individual Medley and the 100 yard butterfly. Kerry Schuermann rounded out the Jaspers individual wins taking the 100 yard backstroke with a time of 1:06.10 second, just 1.41 seconds ahead of her next competitor.
On the men's side, the Jaspers finished first in eight of 11 events. The relay team of Scott Isaacs, Mike Mackay, Lance Neuendorf, and Robert Varieur won the 200 yard medley relay in a time of 1:41.19 seconds. PJ Sweeney followed up the team performance with an individual victory in the 1000 yard freestyle before Baruch finally got their first top finish. Mackay would tack on two individual wins as well finishing first in both the 200 yard IM and 100 yard breastroke while Varieur won both the 50 and 100 yard freestyle events. Cullen Balcanoff (100 yard back) and Chris Fusco (500 yard free) rounded out Manhattan's individual event winners.
The Jaspers will return to action when they travel to Newark, N.J. on Sun. Nov., 18. The men will participate in a tri-meet with NJIT and St. Francis (NY) while the women will face off with only the Terriers.
