GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— Off to a fast start from their opening weekend of action at home, the nation's fourth-ranked Colorado Mesa University men's swimming & diving team will take to the road for the first time of the young season to compete against 18^th-ranked in-state rival Colorado School of Mines in a Friday afternoon and evening Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Dual in Golden.
 
Diving action on both the 1 and 3-meter boards will begin at 2 p.m. while the swimming portion of the 13-event dual will get underway at 5 p.m. in the CSM Natatorium.
 
The dual will be streamed on the RMAC Network and live results can be found through Swimcloud at this link.
 
Meanwhile, the Maverick women will compete Saturday in a triangular against Division I and Pac-12 Conference foes Colorado State and Washington State in Fort Collins.
 
Meet Schedule
 
Following the 2 p.m. diving session, 11 swimming events will be contested in this order on Friday.
 
200 Medley Relay
1000 Free
200 Free
50 Free
400 IM
Break
100 Free
200 Back
500 Free
100 Fly
Break
200 Breast
400 Free Relay
 
The traditional scoring structure will be used with nine team points awarded to the top finisher with four, three, two and points being given to the second through fifth place finishers, respectively.   Relay events will be scored on an 11-4-2 basis.
 
It is also worth nothing that teams can only have three scorers in the individual events and two scoring relay teams.
 
Last Times Out
 
The Mavericks performed quite well at the Intermountain Shootout on the opening weekend of the season (Oct. 2-3).
 
In the first meet on Friday, Oct. 2, the Mavericks claimed first place ahead of Division I and Big XII Conference foes BYU and Utah as well as RMAC rival Adams State. 

The Mavericks scored 200 points and claimed five first place, five second place and six third place finishes to defeat BYU by 24 points while more than doubling Utah's third place score of 93.
 
In the second meet on Saturday, Oct. 3, which was scored separately, the Mavericks took second behind only BYU but were still well ahead of Utah and Adams State.  The Mavs claimed two event wins from Richard Schmeiedefeld (200 Back) and Titouan Bernot (500 Free), who also won the 200 Free in the first meet.
 
Marcos Otero (50 Free), Ben Vester (100 IM), Micah Moore (200 Fly) and the 200 Free Relay squad all claimed victories in the Friday meet as well.
 
National Leaders
 
Six different Maverick individuals and a relay team posted times that lead the early-season NCAA Division II Performance lists in a combined eight championship events as of Wednesday.
 
Here's a look at all of the national leaders with their altitude-adjusted times.
 
200 Free- Titouan Bernot – 1:35.69
500 Free- Bernot- 4:23.97
1000 Free- Jakob Werner- 9:03.24
200 Back- Richard Schmiedefeld – 1:46.10
200 Breast- Marcos Otero- 1:59.50
200 Fly- Micah Moore- 1:46.94
400 IM- Ben Vester- 3:52.47
200 Free Relay- Schmiedefeld, Otero, Daniel Bordin, Emerson Tully- 1:19.42
 
RMAC Sweep
 
The Mavericks swept the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Swimmer & Diver of the Week awards that were announced last Thursday (Oct. 8) after the Intermountain Shootout.
 
Newcomer Titouan Bernot, who still leads the country in two different individual events, was named as the RMAC Men's Swimmer of the Week and recorded NCAA "B" cut times in five different events.
 
Meanwhile, fifth-year senior Wyatt Hermanson was tabbed as the RMAC Diver of the Week for the third time in his career after defeating three BYU divers in both diving events over the weekend while posting the RMAC's best 3-meter score of the season to date (264.30).
 
Top Ten Debuts
 
A group of seven different Maverick newcomers set nine combined times that rank inside CMU's all-time top ten during the Intermountain Shootout.
 
Freshman Jakob Werner set the most impressive mark, turning in a time of 9:14.64 (9:03.24-altitude adjusted) in the 1,000-yard freestyle, less than a half-second off the 2017 school-record time of 9:02.77 (converted), set by program legend Sam Bryant, who holds the CMU record in the 500, 1000 and 1650 free.
 
Meanwhile, Titouan Bernot made a pair of top five debuts and now ranks fourth in the 500 free and fifth in the 200 free with his national-leading times.
 
Freshman Brady Bennett also set a pair of top-10 ranking times and sits sixth in CMU history in the 200 fly at 1:47.61 and eighth in the 200 back at 1:46.85.  Fellow freshman Vitor Baltazar is just behind Bennett in the 200 fly, ranking seventh at 1:48.44.
 
Fellow Brazilian Daniel Bordin also sits eighth in the 100 free at 44.07.
 
Meanwhile, junior transfer Andrew Carlile is tenth in the 100 back at 49.11 while freshman Denny Woods is tenth in the 100 back with a time of 54.96 seconds.
 
Decade Long Streak
 
Although the Mavericks have focused their efforts against NCAA Division I opponents in recent years, something they will do again this year, they have gradually extended winning streaks when meeting up with their fellow RMAC foes.
 
In addition to sweeping the last eight conference championship titles, both Maverick teams carry lengthy RMAC dual meet winning streaks in to the 2025-26 season.
 
The Maverick men have won 15 such straight duals, a streak that dates back a decade to the 2016-17 season.
 
Thirteen of those wins, including a full meet and a diving only dual victory last year, have come against the Colorado School of Mines.
 
In 2025-26, the Mavs won by a 132-109 margin on Oct. 25 in Golden and then won a 16-3 diving dual decision on Nov. 22 at the tail end of the TYR Invitational.
 
Friday's dual is the only true RMAC dual the Maverick men will compete in this year although they will face off with the Orediggers at the TYR Invitational next month and again at the Air Force Quad on Jan. 8 before the RMAC Championships and CMU Last Chance Meet and beat Adams State in both of the Intermountain Shootout meets.
 
About the Orediggers
 
Mines, which finished second behind the Mavs at last year's RMAC Championships before tying for 28^th at the NCAA Championships, has been picked second in the RMAC Preseason Coaches' Poll and 18^th in the CSCAA's Preseason Rankings.
 
They are off to a 1-0 start this season having dominating Adams State by a 655 ½-428 ½ scoreline in an invitational-style scoring dual on Sept. 25 in Alamosa, Colorado.
 
Eighth-year Head Coach Claire McDaniel has a pair of Preseason All-RMAC selections on her men's roster in Vladislav Kazakin (500 Free) and Jack Fulham (100 Fly).  Kazakin has won the 500 free at each of the last two RMAC Championships and won the 1,000 free as well as a freshman.   He earned first team all-American honors in both of those events in 2025 and earned a second team honor in the 800 free relay last year.  Cameron MacMillan and Brenden Cook also return from that relay team that finished 13^th at last year's NCAA Championships.
 
Preseason Polls
 
Both Maverick teams were unanimous selections to win their ninth straight RMAC crowns according to this year's Preseason Coaches' Polls.
 
The Maverick men picked up all five of their possible first place votes to top the poll with 25 points ahead of Mines, which took second in the poll with 21 points while receiving Wender's first place vote.  There are six men's teams in the conference and coaches were asked to rank their opposition 1-5.
 
The Maverick men were also picked fourth in the CSCAA's Preseason Rankings.
 
Preseason All-RMAC
 
The RMAC also announced a Preseason All-RMAC team, made up of the top returning finisher in each individual event from last year's RMAC Championships.
 
Eleven different Maverick athletes received a combined 16 Preseason All-RMAC nods.
 
Swimmers Melina Giraudeau, Richard Schmiedefeld, Aron Jonsson and Ben Vester and diver Talia Datilio were all named in two events.
 
A look back to 2025-26
 
The Mavericks swept the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference titles for the eighth straight year before going on to record third place finishes in both the men's and women's team standings at the NCAA Division II Championships.
 
The men's third place finish was the best in program history. 
 
The Maverick women have now finished amongst the nation's top four in four straight years.
 
The Mavericks combined for 35 podium finishes at the NCAA Championships, including seven national runner-up efforts.
 
At the conference level, the Mavericks dominated the rest of the field winning 32 of the meet's 42 events.
 
The Maverick men won 17 of 21 events at the RMAC Championships, including all five relays, and both diving events as 18 different athletes combined to win 53 of the All-RMAC honors, given to the top four finishers in each event.
 
Sixteen different Maverick women combined for 48 All-RMAC honors as the Maverick women won 15 of the 21 events while taking 33 of the 63 total RMAC Championship medals, three more than the rest of the 9-team field combined.
 
Award-Winners
 
Fittingly, the Mavericks brough in quite a haul of post-season awards at both the national and conference level last year.
 
The Maverick men swept the RMAC major awards.  Guillaume Guth was named as the RMAC Swimmer of the Year while Ryan Campbell won the RMAC Diver of the Year award for the second straight year.  Micah Moore, who returns to the Maverick roster in 2026-27, was selected as the RMAC Freshman of the Year while Mickey Wender claimed RMAC Coach of the Year honors.
 
Wender was also named as the RMAC Women's Coach of the Year while 2026 graduates Olivia Hansson and Kenya Meyer earned RMAC Swimmer and Diver of the Year honors, respectively.
 
Nationally, CMU's Julie Weddle was named as the CSCAA's Men's Diving Coach of the Year after four Maverick divers combined to score 92 team points at the NCAA Championships, helping the Mavs to their best ever overall team finish.  Two of those four men in Jax Juarros and Giani Benoit, return to the CMU's roster this year.
 
Academic Domination
 
The Mavericks also dominated in the classroom and earned a variety of academic awards following the 2025-26 season.
 
The Mavs led all of Division II with 39 CSCAA Scholar All-Americans, a number that matched the Mavs' record. 
 
Four Mavericks were also named as College Sports Communicators Academic All-Americans while CMU also had the maximum allowable eight Academic All-District honorees
 
The Mavericks also dominated the RMAC Academic Awards with Ada Qunell and Ben Vester sweeping the RMAC Academic Athlete of the Year honors before going on to join Kenya Meyer and Richard Schmiedefeld as the Academic All-Americans.
 
The Maverick women led all RMAC teams with their nine First Team Academic All-RMAC picks and 20 selections to the RMAC Academic Honor Roll.  The men had eight First Team Academic All-RMAC picks to match the rest of the conference combined and had a conference-high 15 athletes named to the honor roll.
 
All-American List
 
The Mavericks roster or returning all-Americans is quite lengthy and impressive.
 
The Mavericks had a program-record 31 different individuals combine for 90 CSCAA All-America honors at last year's championships.  The Mavericks return 20 of those people to this year's roster and have 21 total returning all-Americans on this year's roster, including one who earned honors in 2023.
 
The returning group from 2026 earned a combined total of 53 all-America honors last year, which go to the top 16 finishers in each event at the national championships, last season.  The top eight finishers earn first team honors while the ninth through 16^th place finishers are Second Team/Honorable Mention selections.
 
Here's a list of CMU's returning all-Americans along with the number of honors each received in 2026 and the total number in their career.
 
Women
Talia Datilio (2/3)
Melina Giraudeau (5/5)
Taylar Hooton (3/4)
Reagan Horn (2/3)
Jenna Hurley (2/2)
Eva Lehmkuhler (1/1)
Emme Lence (2/2)
Sydnee O'Neil (1/3)
Hanna Sasivarevic (6/7)
Abby Uhl (1/1)
Kendyll Wilkinson (2/5)
 
Men
Giani Benoit (1/1)
Holden Convertino (1/1)
Jonas Friess (3/3)
Wyatt Hermanson (0/2)
Aron Jonsson (3/3)
Jax Juarros (2/2)
Micah Moore (2/2)
Marcos Otero (5/7)
Richard Schmiedefeld (6/11)
Ben Vester (3/4)
 
Up Next
 
The Maverick men will re-unite with their women's counterparts and take on the NCAA Division I Denver Pioneers on Halloween Day (Oct. 31).