Matt Hug

The Miners nearly knocked off the defending NCAA Division II champions Friday evening, but came up about 50 yards short of pulling out the victory.

Drury's Yi Wen Huang used a strong finish on the anchor leg of the 400-yard freestyle relay to pull out the meet victory for the Panthers by a score of 104-100 over the Miners at the UMR Pool.

Huang overtook UMR's David Sanchez-Turner by finishing the final 50 yards of the race in 23.15 seconds, the fastest leg in the race. That allowed the Panthers to overcome UMR's lead heading into the final event of the day.

The Miners got two victories in the meet from Matt Hug, as he swept the distance freestyle events in times of 9:32.67 in the 1,000-yard freestyle and 4:39.01 in the 500-free. The other UMR win came from freshman Andrew Trowbridge as he led a Miner sweep of the top three spots in the 200-freestyle in 1:45.66. Brian Howell finished second in 1:47.97 and Andy Shelley was third in 1:48.47.

UMR also had second place efforts from Mark Chamberlain in the 50-freestyle in 21.86 seconds, Matt Adams in the 200-individual medley in 1:57.38, Howell in the 200-butterfly in 1:58.38, Kyle Kammer in the 200-backstroke in 1:56.64, Trowbridge in the 500-freestyle in 4:43.77 and David Calcara in the 200-breaststroke in 2:10.95.

In addition, the Miners' 400-medley relay team of Kammer, Calcara, Travis Stensby and Sanchez-Turner placed second by just 0.11 seconds in a time of 3:30.58, while the 400-free relay team of Howell, Paul Reinisch, Shelley and Sanchez-Turner posted a time of 3:11.12.

Third place showings were posted by Chris Scheuber in the 50-free in 21.89 seconds, Stensby in the 200-butterfly in 2:00.20, Chamberlain in the 100-freestyle in 48.38 seconds, Dustin Spieker in the 200-backstroke in 1:57.30 and Matt Hammond in the 200-breaststroke in 2:13.94.

UMR's next competition will be at the three-day Western Kentucky Invitational which starts next Friday in Bowling Green, Ky.