Gwo Sweeps Sprints, Lions Finish Fifth at Ivy Championships

Saturday, February 29

Cambridge, Mass.

All Day

Columbia University

Ivy League Championships

Photo by: Omar Rawlings, Sideline Photos

Gwo Sweeps Sprints, Lions Finish Fifth at Ivy Championships

2/29/2020 10:33:00 PM | Men's Swimming and Diving

Saturday Results (PDF)Complete Results (PDF)Highlight: Gwo Wins 100 Free

Junior Albert Gwo won the Ivy League title in the 100-yard freestyle with a time of 43.08

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — The Columbia men's swimming and diving team concluded its run at the 2020 Ivy League Championships on Saturday evening, placing fifth in the team standings with 967 points.

Surely the highlight of the evening came as junior Albert Gwo earned his second gold medal of the meet, clocking in at 43.08 in the 100-yard freestyle to top the field. The win came just two days after the Mountain View, California, native notched the victory in the 50-yard freestyle, successfully completing the sweep of the Ivy sprint events.

Unfortunately, Columbia would have placed fourth in the team standings as senior Nian-Guo Liu posted the second-fastest time in the 200 breaststroke final which would have earned the Lions 28 points, but Liu was disqualified after officials ruled he used a butterfly kick. His unofficial finals time was 1:55.98.

Both senior Cole Stevens and sophomore Joey Licht made their way into the top eight in the 200 backstroke after having also competed in the 100 backstroke the previous day. Stevens led the way with a fifth-place time of 1:44.73, while Licht took seventh in 1:45.82. Junior Baptiste Leger also earned important points in the event, winning the consolation final in 1:44.81.

Senior Zac Pear had Columbia's best time in the 200 butterfly, recording an 11th-place finish in 1:46.62, while first-year Ray Yang took 13th with a time of 1:48.36.

The 1,650 free saw a pair of Lions finish in the top-15, led by sophomore John Scanlon with a 10th-place finish at 15:23.44. Sophomore Shawn Lou was 15th overall, stopping the clock at 15:36.52.

The Lions finished off the meet on a high note, placing second in the 400 free relay as Nian-Guo Liu (43.70), Hayden Liu (44.39), Jonas Kistorp (43.55) and Gwo (42.33) with a time of 2:53.97.

Team Scores
1. Harvard, 1,439
2. Princeton, 1,231
3. Yale, 1,027.5
4. Brown, 976.5
5. Columbia, 967
6. Cornell, 878.5
7. Penn, 794.5
8. Dartmouth, 515

For the latest on the Columbia men's swimming and diving program, follow @ColumbiaMenSwim on Twitter, @ColumbiaMenSwimming and @ColumbiaDiving on Instagram, and on the web at GoColumbiaLions.com.