Eliot Sequin
Earns UCAA's
Male Swimmer Honor
Sophomore freestyler Elliot Sequin (E. Lansing, MI/Cranbrook Kingswood) picked up three victories in last Saturday's meet against Middlebury and swam the opening leg of the winning 200 yard Freestyle Relay team to earn the Upstate Collegiate Athletic Association's “Male Swimmer of the Week” award.
Sequin, who finished fifth in the 200 and second in the 100 freestyle at last year's New York State championships, won the 200 free in 1:47.07, the 50 free in 21.68, and the 100 freestyle race in 47.37.
He contributed a 21.58 in the 200 relay to help the Dutchmen capture the event in 1:28.37.
“Elliot played a major role in our 21st place finish at the national championships last season,” said second-year head coach Scott Felix. “He also finished 17th in the the 100 Freestyle by .02 seconds, leaving him just outside what is necessary to qualify for All-American honors (9th -16th is honorable mention All-America). This season Elliot has trained with a determination that he will not allow that to happen again.”
Besides his individual events at last year's nationals, Sequin was the third leg of the 800 freestyle relay team (which placed ninth), the first leg of both the 400 and 200 freestyle relay teams (which took 11th, and 16th, respectively. His efforts helped Union finish 21st, 17 places than the 38th place finish of the previous season.
“Elliot is a powerful emotional leader,” Felix continued. “We ask him to challenge some of the best swimmers in Division III and he wins. In the first meet this season against the University of Rochester, Elliot went 21.27in the 50 free, which is currently the 10th fastest time in the country. During the Ithaca meet, he broke the pool record in the 50 (21.35) and the 100 (47.19) freestyle.
“I really think that if Elliot continues to swim with the same intensity for the rest of this season, and his junior and senior years, he will graduate with a number of All-American accolades and help our men's program reach the national top 10.”
The final two regular-season meets of the year will be held at Hamilton (February 1) and Amherst (February 8) with the men's state championship set for the weekends of February 26 through March 1 at Wester High School.