Crimson Grabs Gold in Tiger Specialty

There is an old adage in swimming circles--meets are won and lost by freestylers.

Sure, a team needs an individual medleyist or two and a good man in each stroke, but because there are five freestyle events in every swimming meet (plus relays), no coach can expect to win many meets without a strong corps of freestylers.

Since the freestyle events range from 50 to 1650 yards, one can draw a corollary to this adage--a team with a strong group of versatile middle-distance freestylers can never be counted out of any meet.

Princeton coach Bill Farley, who has led his Tiger team to six consecutive Eastern Seaboard Championships, is a strong believer in this corollary.

Farley, himself a former middle-distance man and an American medal winner at the 1964 Olympics, said yesterday "a good middle-distance man that can move up or down. The same guy can swim the 500 or 1650 and then come right back and give you a solid leg on one of the relays."

Yesterday's episode of the ongoing Eastern Championships provided a graphic illustration of the old saw.

Princeton dominated the 200-yd. freestyle, placing four men in the championship final and piling up 58 points with their first, fourth, seventh, eighth place finishes.

Because of the Tigers' awesome showing in the 200, it appeared impossible that anyone would touch them in the day's final event, the 800-yd. freestyle relay. No other team had placed more than two swimmers in the top sixteen in the 200, and Princeton had four of the top eight.

Harvard's Bobby Hackett had taken second in the 200, and Julian Mack had won the consolation heat to grab ninth, but that is only two swimmers and you need four for a relay.

Ah, but look, Jack Gauthier swam the butterfly, but during the dual meet season, he also swam the 200. And Mike Coglin; he was in the 400 individual medley, but he can churn out a decent 200 himself. Mack is ready to swim, and Hackett isn't feeling well, but he's game to give them a run for it.

Enter Crimson coach Joe Bernal and remember what Bobby Hackett said after the Princeton dual meet: "Meet coaching is Coach Bernal's forte."

Bernal looks at his squad and figures that their best chance to win is to put Hackett up first and try to get some open water between his team and the Tigers. "This was meant to put some pressure on their guys. We figured that by getting out in the lead, maybe we could mess up their race-plan a little," Bernal said afterwards.

The strategy worked perfectly as Hackett jumped out to a body length lead. Mack and Gauthier increased the Crimson margin lead, each swimming their best 200s of the year, and Mike Coglin held off a furious finish by 200 champ Andy Saltzman to sew up the victory.

Reviewing the splits, the irony of the whole situation becomes apparent. Craig Peterson, Princeton's second man, could not equal the lifetime best 1:41 clocking he turned in during the afternoon heats. He split 1:43. Everyone else on both relays swam 1:42.2 or better.

In the end, it was the freestylers that decided the margin of Harvard's lead going into the final day--and yesterday Princeton, the team that takes so much pride in its freestyle depth, came up one man short.

Eastem Seaboard Swimming and Diving Championships

Friday night's results:

Event Six: 400-yd Individual Medley--1. Ron Ralkula, Harvard, 4:02.43. 2. Michael Coglin, Harvard, 4:02.54. 3. Ronald Cummings, Princeton, 4:02.81. 4. Timothy Maximoff, Harvard, 4:04.45. 5. Lincoln Djang, Columbia, 4:05.24. 6. Robert Ruck, Army, 4:05.74. 7. Robert Clayton, Princeton, 4:08.13. 8. Greg Dozer, Dartmouth, 4:12.64.

Event Seven: 200-yd. Freestyle--1. Andrew Saltzman, Princeton, 1:39.01. 2. Robert Hackett, Harvard, 1:39.55. 3. Todd Taylor, Dartmouth, 1:39.66. 4. Andrew O'Hara, Princeton, 1:40.10. 5. Frank May, Fordham, 1:40.34. 6. Bradley Brown, Army, 1:41.46. 7. Howard Nelson, Princeton, 1:41.48. 8. Craig Peterson, Princeton, 1:43.14.

Event Eight: 100-yd. Butterfly--1. Bruce Kone, Princeton, 50.32. 2. John Gauthier, Harvard, 50.48. 3. Mark DeVore, Yale, 50.51. 4. William Specht, Princeton, 50.60. 5. Sam O'Leary, U. North Carolina, 50.68. 6. Malcolm Cooper, Harvard, 50.86. 7. Eric Wiscavage, Columbia, 50.87. 8. Glenn Levin, Brown, 51.17.

Event Nine: 100-yd. Backstroke--1. Mark Heinrich, Navy, 52.39. 2. Geoffrey Seelen, Harvard, 52.50. 3. Chris Prinslow, Army, 52.80. 4. Kurt Langborg, Yale, 52.93. 5. Richard Meier, Princeton, 53.02. 6. James Smoragiewicz, U. Maine, 53.51. 7. Thomas Wilhelm, Army, 54.11. 8. John Wierik, Temple, 54.30.

Event Ten: 100-yd. Breaststroke--1. Koji Mishimura, Army, 57.37. 2. John Christensen, Princeton, 58.49. 3. Kent Whitaker, Dartmouth, 58.74. 4. Alex Rae-Grant, Yale, 58.89. 5. Dirk Crandell, Cornell, 59.48. 6. Paul Mansfield, Drexel, 59.52. 7. Chris Judge, Fordham, 59.77. 8. Frank Polefrone, Bucknell, 1:00.06.

Event Eleven: 800-yd. Freestyle Relay--1. Harvard (Hackett, Mack, Gauthier, Coglin), 6:41.84. 2. Princeton (O'Hara, Peterson, Nelson, Saltzman), 6:41.87. 3. Dartmouth, 6:50.13. 4. U. Maine, 6:51.03. 5. Navy, 6:51.51. 6. Fordham, 6:57.29. 7. Yale, 6:57.66. 8. Columbia, 7:04.89.