By: Sam Boender
GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. – A plethora of career bests and NCAA "B" cuts filled the results for the nationally-ranked Colorado School of Mines Men's and Women's Swimming teams on Thursday morning at the 2025 RMAC Swimming & Diving Championships.
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Morning prelims included the 100-fly, 400-IM, and 200-free. There were also time trials afterward, but Mines did not take part in those. Oredigger results from the preliminary races included 31 individuals advancing to evening finals, five NCAA "B" cuts, and numerous personal-best times. Mines' top highlights from Thursday morning arguably came in the women's 400-IM and the men's 200-free. All three Oredigger swimmers in the 400-IM advanced to the "A" final with a chance to win individual gold. In the men's 200-free, Mines swimmers claimed seven of 16 possible spots in the evening session.
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Action started at 10 a.m. with the 100-fly, and Mines wasted no time punching tickets to finals and guaranteeing team points.
Kylie VanderMeer raced her way to the "A" final by taking seventh in qualifying.
Savannah Karas,
Sophia Buhr,
Sophia Cristal,
Ava Burger, and
Kerrigan Hemp were not far behind, claiming berths in the "B" and "C" races. On the men's side,
Luca Burns and
Michael Kietzman advanced to the evening's fast race.
Vladislav Kazakin and
Max Waring made it four Orediggers swimming for points in the 100-fly on Thursday night.
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Next came the 400-IM and more fireworks from Mines. As previously mentioned, all three Oredigger women entered in the race sped to spots in the "A" final for a shot at RMAC glory. Those three swimmers were
Isabella Bono,
Zooecia Phoebus, and
Julie Gill. Bono's qualifying time was also a NCAA "B" cut converted to 4:29.46 for altitude. That seeded her third with Phoebus and Gill grabbing the sixth and eighth slots, respectively. For the men,
Ronan Lauinger finished second in prelims and
Gavin Moore was eighth to make a Mines duo racing for conference gold.
Lucas Hoke and
Andres Saa grabbed spots in the "B" final.
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The morning finale was the 200-free.
Jennifer Pierson,
Ava LaBrose,
Maggie Wells,
Eden Addison,
Olivia Kisow,
Elizabeth Powers, and
Emi Jedryka all cemented a chance to score points for Mines in the team standings with berths in the "B" and "C" races Thursday evening. Pierson and LaBrose both qualified by swimming NCAA "B" cuts. The cherry on top of the Orediggers' morning session was the group of seven men mentioned in the opening paragraph.
Cameron MacMillan and Kazakin both churned out NCAA "B" times for spots in the "A" final. Then,
Jaron O'Grady,
Sawyer Jones,
Brenden Cook,
Joseph Lev-Tov, and
Jake Sherman ate up five more positions in the "B" final. After the waves had settled the results showed the top five swimmers for Mines finishing 7-8-9-10-11.
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Additional Thursday swims for the Orediggers came from
Lucas Waasdorp,
Oliver Theby,
Mattie Oberley,
Jack Engler,
Abby Swanson, and
Kevin Burns. Waasdorp, Theby, Oberley, and Engler all raced the 100-fly. Swanson and Burns both appeared in the 200-free.
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Finals in the 100-fly, 400-IM, 200-free, diving, and the 400-medley relay will begin at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday evening with pay-per-view streaming on the RMAC Network.
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Fans can keep up with Mines swimming on "X" (formerly Twitter), Facebook and Instagram at @MinesSwimming. They can also keep up with Colorado School of Mines Athletics all year long on Facebook, "X" and Instagram using the handle @MinesAthletics.