NEW ROCHELLE, NY - Competing for the second straight day at the Hynes Center Pool, the Iona University men's and women's swimming and diving teams came away with a split against visiting Holy Cross. The men rebounded from a loss Friday afternoon vs. NJIT to win convincingly by a score of 170-121. The women traded event wins with the Crusaders, before falling 178-116 for its second loss of the season.
 
The men grabbed nine first place finishes in the 14 individual events as well as the top spot in both the 200-medley and 400-freestyle relay events.
 
Senior co-captain Michael Faughnan paced the Gaels with wins in the 1,000-yard freestyle (9:53.67), 200-freestyle (1:41.79) and the 500-freestlye (4:43.15) as well posting a strong lead-off 100-yard freestyle leg of 46.27.
 
Sophomore diver Dylan Riccio had another strong day, winning both the 1-Meter and 3-Meter springboard events with respective totals of 216.75 and 244.50-points.
 
Freshmen Kieran Egan and Noah Giunta each picked up multiple individual and relay wins. Egan led off the 200-medley relay with a 24.50 backstroke leg. He returned to take the 100-backstroke at 53.14 and the 200-backstroke at 1:54.21. He also served on the winning 400-freestyle relay with Faughnan, Nathaniel Wales and Mikel Palaj which clocked in at 3:09.51.
 
Giunta swam the butterfly leg on the winning 200-medley relay and returned to win both the 100- and 200-butterfly events with respective times of 52.56 and 1:56.47.
 
The Iona women claimed four individual wins, led by senior co-captain Megan Josephs who touched first in the 50-freestyle at 25.07 and the 100-freestlye at 54.06. Graduate student Tristan Urso touched first in the 1000-freestyle at 10:47.67 as junior Ashley Benkert won the 100-butterfly at 58.69.
 
Benkert, Josephs, junior Molly Finn and graduate Isabella Nicholson combined to win the 200-medley relay at 1:49.64.
 
"Collectively we had a much higher degree of aggressiveness today than yesterday," said head coach Nick Cavataro. "We saw kids attack the first half of races, rather than holding back and it led to much better efforts up and down the lineups."
 
"If we can build off this into next week's tri-meet with Sacred Heart and Wagner, good things will happen," Cavataro added.
 
The Sacred Heart, Wagner, Iona Tri-Meet takes place next Saturday, October 14, as part of Iona's Homecoming & Family Weekend festivities. Diving begins at 8:30 a.m. and swimming events at 11:30 a.m. at the Hynes Center Pool.