GREENSBORO, N.C. – The McKendree University men's swimming and diving team took home a silver and bronze medal here Thursday evening on the second day of the 2022 NCAA Division II Swimming & Diving Championships being held here at the Greensboro Aquatic Center.
 
On Thursday perhaps the highlight of night was the National Runner-up finish by the Bearcats in the 400 medley relay as McKendree's silver medal team recorded a new school record time of 3:08.33 in the event. The time bettered the old school record of 3:09.63 set at this year's Great Lakes Valley Conference Championships. The members of the national runner-up 400 medley relay team were junior DaVante Carey (Nassau, Bahamas/Queens College), sophomore Filipe Pinheiro (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil/Colegio Ao Cubo), senior Gregg Lichinsky (West Des Moines, Iowa/Valley) and graduate student Xander Skinner (Namibia, Africa/Windhoek Afrikaans Private School).
 
That silver medal in the 400 medley relay scored 34 points for the Bearcats as McKendree scored a total of 82 points on the second day of competition to push their total to 161 points to remain in fourth place overall.
 
Queens (NC) continues to lead with 330 points, while Drury is second with 231 points and Indianapolis is in third place with 217 points. Findlay (Ohio) is in fifth place with 129 points.
 
The Bearcats opened Thursday's finals with a bronze medal in the 100 butterfly from Lichinsky, who recorded a time of 46.45 to finish in third place and earn the Bearcats' first medal of the championships and also earn First-Team All-American honors. In addition to Lichinsky's third place finish, freshman Emilio Perez (Milwaukee, Wis./Greenfield) swam a time of 47.69 to finish 13th overall and fifth in the consolation final. Lichinsky and Perez scored a total of 20 points for the Bearcats in the 100 butterfly.
 
After not having swimmer compete in the 400 IM, the Bearcats would just miss winning a second individual medal on the night in the 200 freestyle as Skinner fell 18 hundredths of second shy of earning a bronze medal in the event as he placed fourth overall with a time of 1:35.38. That was just .03 seconds shy of Skinner's school record time of 1:35.35 that was set at this year's GLVC Championships. With his performance, Skinner also earned First-Team All-American honors.
 
In addition to Skinner's fourth place finish in the 200 freestyle, sophomore Alireza Yavari (Isfahan, Iran/Shayestegan) placed sixth in the event with a time of 1:36.61 to also earn First-Team All-American honors. Yavari's sixth place finish was even more impressive considering he earned his spot in the championship final following a swim-off in Thursday's preliminaries against OCU's Brandon Heredia. In that swim-off, Yavari defeated Heredia, 1:36.17-1:36.96.
 
The Bearcats scored a total of 28 points in the 200 freestyle.

At the NCAA National Championship Meet, the top eight swimmers in each individual event earn First Team All-American honors, while places 9-16 receive Honorable Mention All-American accolades. 
 
In Friday's third day of the four-day championship meet, the Bearcats will compete in all four of the preliminary events as Carey, Perez and freshman Patryk Rozenek (Radlin, Poland/Zsoms Raciborz) will swim in the 100 backstroke, while Pinheiro will swim in the 100 breaststroke and freshman Jackson Lustig (Milwaukee, Wis./Pius XI) and senior Noah Javens (West Lafayette, Ind./Willam Henry Harrison swimming in the 200 butterfly. In addition, senior Ethan Larson (Anchorage, Alaska/PAIDAIE Cooperative School) will compete in the 3-meter diving prelims. Larson placed 10th on Wednesday in the 1-meter diving competition.