The UMBC men’s swimming and diving team won the America East championship in a four-day meet which concluded Feb. 16 at Worcester Polytechnic Institute
The UMBC women finished second to New Hampshire. UNH totaled 876 points, while the Retrievers compiled 759.5, ahead of five other squads.
The Retriever men have captured 12 of the 13 championships and three in a row since America East re-instituted men’s swimming and diving as a championship sport. UMBC, which captured 16 of 18 swimming events, amassed 1,051 points, well ahead of second-place Binghamton at 807.
UMBC senior Ilia Rattsev swept the freestyle sprints (50, 100, 200 yards) and became the first ever swimmer in America East history to sweep the freestyle sprints three consecutive years. He earned the league’s David Alexander Coaches’ Award as the senior with the most points accrued at the meet. America East honored Rattsev with their Elite 18 Award, which is presented to the top-achieving student-athlete at the championships. Rattsev is maintaining a 3.97 GPA in bioinformatics and computational biology.
