GREENSBORO, N.C. – Virginia Tech senior men's diver Ben Schiesl claimed bronze on Wednesday during the opening day of the 2019 ACC Women's Swimming and Men's and Women's Diving Championships at the Greensboro Aquatic Center.
Schiesl took sixth in the prelims of the men's 1-meter, scoring 300.70 to qualify for the evening's finals. He came out strong in the second session of the day to turn in a score of 357.40 to finish with the bronze medal.
"Ben struggled a bit in the prelims and had to turn in some great dives in the last couple rounds to even make the finals," said head diving coach Ron Piemonte. "So for him to come back and dive as he did in the finals was a really great performance. This was his highest finish ever at ACCs and it made for a great ending of the day."
"Very excited for Ben and his third place finish," said head coach Sergio Lopez Miro. "First time that he gets on the ACC podium and it could not have happened to a nicer person too. I am very proud of the work that Ron does day in and day out with our divers."
On the swimming side, the Hokies got off to a solid start as the women's 200 medley relay team of Emily Meilus (So.), Joelle Vereb (So.), Kayla Purcell (Jr.) and Abby Larson (Fr.) cut 1.02 off their entry time to finish eighth in a time of 1:38.51.
"Today we had a good start of the 2019 ACC Championships," said Lopez Miro. "Our 200 medley relay was good since Emily and Kayla swam lifetime bests and Joelle and Abby were very close to their lifetime bests. It was exciting to see because this is a very young relay and they had our season best."
In the 800 free relay, the Hokies again cut their time as quartet of Loulou Vos (Fr.), Eleanor Matheson (Sr.), Danielle Griggs (Sr.) and Reka Gyorgy (Jr.) dropped their time by 6.58 seconds to finish in ninth with a time of 7:12.45.
"The 800 free relay was solid," Lopez Miro said. "we had two swimmers, Danielle and Reka, who swam lifetime bests and Loulou and Eleanor both did very good considering they have both been injured. This relay was our season best by 6.58 seconds. I have no doubt that we will keep getting better as the sessions take place. I am very excited to see what our Hokies bring to the table tomorrow morning at prelims."
On the women's boards, senior Ashlynn Peters had the top finish for the Hokies, placing 10th in the 3-meter with a score of 280.50. Freshman Brooke Leftwich claimed 19th with a tally of 241.40.
"On the women's side, we were pretty off today," said Piemonte. "Ashlynn has been really consistent lately, but today she was just off a bit and ended up missing the finals by just three points. A 10th place finish is still a good day though. The big surprise of the day was Brooke. She was one of the last people to make the ACC team for us and she went out and took advantage of her opportunity."
Freshman Noah Zawadzki had a score of 270.05 to take 14th in the men's 3-meter.
"Noah had a rough start in the 1-meter," said Piemonte. "And after three rounds he was in last place or close to it, but he came back and finished 14th out of 32 divers."
The Hokies will be back in the pool tomorrow beginning at 10 a.m. with the women's 500 free prelims at the Greensboro Aquatic Center.
