David Schlicht Posts 3:40 400 IM at Arizona Invite

Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick

Arizona’s David Schlicht, making his season debut after an Olympic redshirt last season, won the 400 IM on day two of the Arizona Invite in Tucson with an impressive swim of 3:40.93. That swim puts him third in Division I this season behind Carson Foster (3:35.27) and Shaine Casas (3:38.22) and is just off his best time of 3:40.1 from 2019. Schlicht won comfortably ahead of Etay Gurevich (3:52.49).

Brooks Fail, who was seeded fifth at NCAAs last season before the championships were cancelled, cruised to a 15:02.28 in the 1650 and was off his best of 14:37 from last year’s Minnesota Invite. Leah Smith, one of Arizona’s postgrad swimmers, swam to a 16:03.49 in her first 1650 since before the pandemic. Smith recently returned from Budapest where she swam for the Tokyo Frog Kings at the International Swimming League.

Matt Grevers, another postgrad that also swam in the ISL for Energy Standard, won the 50 free at 19.66 to finish ahead of Grand Canyon’s Florent Janin (20.00) as Kayla Filipek won the women’s 50 free at 22.78.

Freshman Faith Knelson, one of Arizona’s top signed recruits, won the 200 breast with a 2:16.55, while Sam Iida won the men’s race at 1:56.74.

Noah Reid also won the 100 butterfly at 46.67, which put him 15th in Division I this season while Ogi Maric won the 200 back at 1:41.82 to put him tied for eighth in Division I this season with Missouri’s Jack Dahlgren.

Grand Canyon’s Emily Muteti got the Antelopes’ lone win on the night in the 100 fly with a 54.44. Arizona’s Axana Merckx was a double winner on Friday in the 200 back (1:58.67) and 400 IM (4:26.54) to open up her sophomore season.

Other winners on the night were Hunter Ingram (1:36.52) and Amalie Mortensen (1:47.37) in the 200 free.

The Wildcat relays also raced on Friday night with the women’s 200 medley relay touching at 1:38.89 with Aria Bernal (25.37), Jade Neser (27.61), Julia Heimstead (23.87) and Filipek (22.04) and the 400 free relay touching at 3:20.44 with Mortensen (50.41), Filipek (48.80), Alayna Connor (51.02) and Heimstead (50.21).

The Arizona men put themselves 10th nationally in the medley relay at 1:25.83 with the team of Maric (21.70), Ryan Foote (23.76), Reid (20.67) and Marin Ercegovic (19.70) while the 400 free relay team swam a 2:54.56 with Maric (43.70), Ercegovic (44.43), Reid (42.92) and Fail (43.51).

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