GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— Colorado Mesa University swimming sensation Ben Sampson stole the show on Thursday as he set seven new school, meet and pool records combined to lead a continued Mavericks surge on the second day of the TYR/CMU Invitational at the El Pomar Natatorium.

Sampson also moved into the No. 3 position in NCAA Division II all-time history with an altitude-adjusted 200-yard individual medley time of 1:43.76 (1:44.96 actual) in Thursday evening's finals after taking the No. 5 spot during the preliminary heats in the morning, with a time of 1:46.00 (1:44.80-converted).
 
In both races, he easily smashed the El Pomar Natatorium (1:47.27), meet (1:48.85) and his own Maverick record of 1:46.41.  The pool record had been held by Cal Baptist's Joshua Hanson and had stood for six years.  Sampson had set the former meet record last year and the school record at the 2022 NCAA Division II National Championships.
 
Sampson also turned in a new 50 butterfly school-record of 22.82 seconds on the opening stroke of that individual medley and then came back to set a new 50 free meet and school record time of 19.89 seconds as the lead-off leg on a 200 free relay time trial that closed out his phenomenal day.
 
In the process, he teamed with Mado Elkady, Felipe D'Orsi and Kuba Kiszczak to break the meet record in the relay with a combined and NCAA qualifying time of 1:20.28, just minutes after the same four men had been disqualified in the official event due to an early exchange.
 
Sampson was not the record-setting Maverick of the night as Lily Borgenheimer (women's 200 IM), Dejan Urbanek (men's 500 free) and the women's 200 free relay team of Ruby Bottai, Izzy Powers, Elli Williams and Logan Anderson all set meet records.
 
Bottai had also set the 50 free school record to win that event just minutes earlier before leading the relay team to a school-record time as well.
 
Additionally, the Mavericks won six more events and racked up 29 more automatic or provisional qualifying times for the national meet throughout the day after winning all six of Wednesday's night's events with meet record times.
 
In the process, the Maverick women extended their team-scoring lead to 109 points over Division I Northern Arizona and the rest of the 7-women's team field while the Maverick men now lead by 143 points over Mines and the rest of the 4-team men's field.
 
CMU's women now have 484 points while NAU has 375.  Mines is third with 282, nearly doubling fourth-place Western Colorado's 142.
 
The Maverick men have racked up 549 ½ points through seven events.  Mines has 416 ½.
 
After setting the table during a solid preliminary round session, the Mavericks got out to a strong start in a very fast women's 500 free as five different Mavs set NCAA "B" cut times over the two scoring heats.
 
Freshman Olivia Hansson led the way, taking third in 4:57.13 (4:52.13-converted) to rank second in program history.  Amelia Kinnard finished fifth in 4:57.71 and had an even quicker preliminary heat time of 4:57.27 (4:52.27-converted) to rank third in CMU history. 
 
School-record holder Katerina Matoskova finished eighth in 5:03.38 and completed her preliminary heat in 4:59.00 (4:54.00-converted).  Meanwhile, freshmen Ada Qunell and Haven Hinkle also set provisional qualifying times in the consolation final.  Qunell was tenth overall in 5:03.91 (4:58.91-converted) to rank sixth in CMU history while Hinkle was 11^th overall and third in the heat with a time of 5:05.48 (4:59.48-converted).  She now stands eighth in CMU history.
 
The Maverick men then took the top six spots in the men's 500 free as four of them set NCAA provisional qualifying times during the finals after all six did during the prelims.  Urbanek led the way with his meet record time of 4:28.46, which goes to a new personal best of 4:23.46 with the altitude-adjustment.  He continues to rank second in CMU lore behind only Sam Bryant.
 
Meanwhile, graduate transfer Kyle Benjamin finished second in 4:30.63 (4:25.63-converted) to take over the No. 3 spot in Maverick history.  Gavin Anderson finished third in 4:35.56 (4:30.56-converted) while Jacob Troescher touched fourth in 4:36.73 after going slightly quicker (4:36.32/4:31.32-converted) during the preliminary heats.  Troescher now stands tenth in CMU history.
 
During the morning, freshman Gavyn Tatge (4:32.10) and Austin Mondello (4:34.43) set altitude-adjusted NCAA "B" cut times before taking fifth and sixth, respectively in the finals.
 
The Mavs continued to roll in the women's 200 IM and took advantage of a disqualification as Borgenheimer set a new meet record time of 2:02.16 in the finals after going 2:02.45 in the morning.  Both were lower than her winning time of 2:03.14 last year.  Northern Arizona's Haley Mayhew momentarily had the meet record and the win but was disqualified.
 
Meanwhile, CMU's Davy Brown finished second in 2:03.88 (2:02.68-converted) to join Borgenheimer, who had a converted time of 2:00.96, as provisional NCAA qualifiers.
 
Minutes later, Sampson turned in his historic men's 200 IM time as the Mavericks had five of the top seven finishers, who all went under the NCAA "B" cut standard.  Sampson was an automatic qualifier while Matheus Laperriere finished second in 1:49.44 (1:48.24-converted) to improve his No. 3 position in program history.
 
Fifth-year senior Mahmoud Elgayar finished fourth in 1:50.31 (1:49.11-converted) while freshman Mauricio Posadas took fifth in 1:50.69 (1:49.49-converted) to move into eighth in program history.  Sophomore John Walgast also set a NCAA provisional qualifying time of 1:51.42 (1:50.22-converted) to squeeze into the Maverick all-time top 10 while finishing seventh on the night.
 
The sprinters then took over as Bottai won the women's 50 free in 23.32 seconds to break Sierra Forbord's former Maverick standard of 23.37.  Powers (23.89), Williams (23.90) and Anderson (23.92) all set NCAA provisional qualifying times as well.
 
Qunell also turned in a provisional qualifying mark of 23.93 seconds in the preliminaries.
 
In the men's 50 free, Elkady claimed victory in 20.15 seconds as he D'Orsi (20.55) and Kiszczak (20.51-prelims) all set NCAA provisional qualifying times during the day.  Elkady also moved up three spots to fourth in Maverick history.
 
The Mavs' final event win then came in the women's 200 free as the earlier mentioned quartet turned in a time of 1:33.21 to set a school and meet record and win by more than two seconds.  Thursday's time broke the 3-year old meet record of 1:34.44 that Anderson had been a part of and was also 0.61 seconds quicker than the Mavs' 2020 RMAC Championship school-record time of 1:33.82.
 
Day 3 of the meet will begin at 10 a.m. with preliminary heats in the 100 fly, 400 IM, 200 free, 100 breast and 100 back.  The longest finals session of the meet will then get under way at 5 p.m. with finals in those events as well as the 400 medley relay at the end of the night.