GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— After navigating through a challenging pandemic-effected 2020-21 season to claim their third straight Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference team titles and post their best ever national championship finishes, the Colorado Mesa University men's & women's swimming and diving teams are eager to get what they hope will be a much more normal, yet equally successful 2021-22 season this weekend.
The Mavericks will get the season started at home, hosting the 11
th annual and largest-ever Intermountain Shootout on Friday evening and Saturday at the El Pomar Natatorium. Admission is free and sessions will begin at 5 p.m. on Friday and 10 a.m. on Saturday.
Live results can be accessed at the link above or via MeetMobile and separate live streams (natural sound only) of the swimming and diving events can be found on the RMAC Network.
Loaded Field
A total of nine women's and five men's squads are slated to compete. The field includes five NCAA Division I programs in Air Force, BYU, Colorado State, Dixie State and Northern Colorado, the last three of which only have women's programs. The Mavericks will also be joined by Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference rivals Adams State (men and women) and CSU Pueblo (women only). The CMU Club team will also compete.
Meet Format
A total of 44 events —22 for each gender— will be contested and team scores will be kept in a dual meet format that will see each team have a head-to-head score with each opponent. Points in each dual will be distributed on a 9-4-3-2-1 basis in individual events with a maximum of three scores per team. The relay points will be given out on an 11-4-2 basis in each dual with only the "A" and "B" relays eligible to score.
Individual swimmers will be limited to seven total and five individual scoring events although they can compete in additional exhibition events as desired.
The list of individual swimming events includes the 50-yard butterfly, 50 breast and 100 IM, which are rarely contested.
Diving competitions will also be held concurrently with the swimming events on both the 1 and 3-meter boards and will be contested under a 6-dive format.
Shooting It Out
The Intermountain Shootout was not held in 2020 due to COVID-19 ramifications, a microcosm of a strange 2020-21 season, that was severely impacted and disjointed by the pandemic. The Mavericks were also unable to host the annual A3 Performance Invitational and had limited dual-meet opportunities leading into the RMAC Championships, which the Mavericks hosted and won in a split-session and streamlined format. The NCAA Division II Championships were also streamlined slightly as relay only swimmers were not allowed to compete as they have in other years.
Before 2020, the Mavericks had started each season with the Intermountain Shootout since 2011. The first shootout was held in 2010 as CMU's second meet.
In 2019, the Mavericks competed against Air Force, BYU and the CMU Club Team in a 4-team Intermountain Shootout, going 1-2.
RMAC Dominance
The Maverick teams have won the last three RMAC Championship titles and also enter 2021-22 with long-standing RMAC dual-meet winning streaks.
The Maverick women won all three duals against RMAC foes last season and have won 25 consecutive RMAC duals dating back more than five years to Jan. 22, 2016. They will have a chance to extend that streak to 27 this weekend with victories over Adams State and CSU Pueblo.
CMU's men had just two dual meets all of last year, both against Division I foes in BYU and Utah. However, they have won eight straight RMAC duals since the start of the 2016-17 campaign and will be savoring the opportunity to host duals this year.
Returning All-Americans
After claiming all-time program-best finishes of 11
th (men) and 12
th (women) at the 2021 NCAA Division II National Championships in Birmingham, Alabama, the Mavericks appear to be quite strong once again this season with the return of 17 athletes, who have previous earned all-America honors in 2021 and/or prior seasons.
The list of returning all-Americans men includes diving selections
Tanner Belliston and
Isaiah Cheeks, as well as swimming standouts
Lane Austin,
Felipe D'Orsi,
Mahmoud Elgayar,
Logan Ellis and
Matheus Laperreire.
The CMU women are even deeper with the return of all-Americans
Logan Anderson,
Lily Borgenheimer,
Davy Brown,
Sarah Fillerup,
Katerina Matoskova,
Robyn Naze,
Lauren White and
Kelsea Wright in the swimming events as well as
Jolynn Harris and
Ali Lange on the diving boards. Harris finished second on the 1-meter board at last year's national championships while Borgenheimer and White each won six CSCAA All-America certificates last year to co-set the program record for honors in a single season.
Defending Champions a plenty
The Mavericks will also have a host of returning RMAC Champions who will look to defend their titles in February. On the men's side, the Mavericks won 17 events in 2021 and return the champions in ten of the 12 individual events they won. That list includes
Gavin Anderson (1000 & 1650 free),
Matheus Laperreire (200 Free, 500 Free, 200 IM),
Ben Sampson (50 Free, 100 Back),
Mahmoud Elgayar (100 Breast, 200 Breast) and
Jake Simmons (400 IM). The Maverick men also swept all five of the relay events last season and return 18 of the combined 20 legs from those quartets.
The Mavs do have to replace RMAC Diver of the Year
Chandler Livingston and 5-time NCAA Division II Champion and NCAA Division II Diver of the Year
Ammar Hassan, who both won RMAC diving titles in 2021.
The Maverick women won a meet-high nine events last season, and like their male counterparts, swept the relay wins.
Lily Borgenheimer (200 IM, 200 Breast) and
Lauren White (200 Free) return as do 12 combined legs from the winning relay teams. The only individual RMAC Champion they must replace is
Grace Payton (400 IM), who graduated as the RMAC Women's Swimming/Diving Academic Athlete of the Year.
Coaching Staff
Mickey Wender enters his third year as the Mavericks' head coach and is 30
th overall as a collegiate head coach, a career that included stops at Division I Army West Point (2006-19) and Washington (1998-2006) after a stint at UC-Santa Cruz (1992-98).
Leading the Maverick men's and women's teams to RMAC title sweeps in each of his first two years, Wender has racked up more than 400 dual meet wins in his career. He also served as the head coach for the 2008 American Samoa Olympic Team in Beijing, China and has coached swimmers at every U.S. Olympic Trails since 2000, a streak that continued with the participation of Borgenheimer at last summer's trials.
Wender's full-time assistants include
Kinsey Laine, also CMU's triathlon coach, and veterans
Billy McGowan, the team's new diving coach who had been in a similar role at Division I Iona, and new assistant swimming coach
Andy Parro, the former head coach at Division III Illinois Tech.
Wender's staff also includes six volunteer coaches, including former Maverick swimmers Justin Fell and
Noah Vallee as well Ed Stehlin, the El Pomar Natatorium Pool Manager and CMU Club Team Coach. Peter Byers, Charles Clark and Alec Knight are also volunteer assistant coaches.
CMU student Savannah McGuire is the team's manager.
Home Friendly Start & Finish
Including this week's meet, the Mavericks will be at home for three of their four meets in the opening half of the season. CMU will also host Augustana, Mines and Western Colorado (women only) in a series of triangular/quadrangular meets on Oct. 22-23 and will then host the A3 Performance Invitational from Nov. 17-20. CMU's lone away trip of the 2021 portion of the schedule is at Wyoming on Nov. 5. The women will compete against the hosts and CSU on that day in Laramie.
After taking December off from competition, the Mavs will be away at Air Force, Mines, BYU and Utah in January and will then host the RMAC Championships once again from Feb. 9-12.
Be on the lookout
The RMAC will announce the RMAC Preseason Coaches' Polls on Friday morning at 10 a.m. As the 3-time defending champions, it would be surprising if the Mavs were not picked atop those polls once again.
