CAMBRIDGE, Mass. —
Noah Reice (Wilmington, Del.) closed out a dominant showing at the 2026 New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) Swimming & Diving Championships by winning the 200 Fly for his third individual title of the weekend as the United States Coast Guard Academy men's team finished as runners-up to hosts Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Sunday
With a nor'easter expected to hit the northeast in the evening, the meet's format saw a change from the usual 10 AM preliminary races and 6 PM finals. Instead, the day saw all races competed in a times finals format. Each event saw multiple heats, going slowest seed time to fastest, with the final times reordered by speed.
Reice took home his third gold medal and First Team All-Conference distinction of the weekend with a wire-to-wire 1:47.68 finish in the 200 Fly, which also made him a back-to-back NEWMAC champion in the event.
Jason Manzo (Helotes, Tex.) also secured a top-ten finish by going 1:54.13 for seventh, and freshman
Leon Zhang (Cary, N.C.) capped his first championship meet by swimming 1:55.15 for ninth.
Freshman distance specialist
Jay Pawloski (St. Leonard, Md.) earned the first All-Conference distinction of his career by swimming a second-best 16:16.09 in the 1650 Free.
Eliot Maravich (Pittsburgh, Pa.) swam 16:32.29 to take fourth.
USCGA saw ample representation in the 200 Back, led by
Zach McGowen's (Springfield, Va.) 1:51.32 effort for third place.
Gabriel McCallen (Niceville, Fla.),
Baylor Weiler (Lexington, Ky.), and
Logan Kwon (University Place, Wash.) swam respective times of 1:53.85, 1:54.57, and 1:54.83 for fifth through sixth, and
Jordan Jansen (Tampa, Fla.) rounded it out with a 1:56.18 swim for tenth.
A highly-successful 200 Breast portion of the day culminated in two Bears on the podium and four in total in the top ten.
Blaise Minckler (Hilton Head Island, S.C.) earned All-Conference honors by going 2:02.89 for second place, with
John Kaleta (Morrow, Ohio) right on his heels in 2:02.85 for third.
Matt Carper (Pittsburgh, Pa.) took fourth with a 2:04.06 swim and
Patrick Young (Lucinda, Pa.) went 2:06.50 for ninth. The finish was particularly sweet for Minckler, who took third in the event just a year ago.
Championship weekend closed with the 400 Free Relay, and the Bears' team of Reice,
Grant Hudson (Peachtree City, Ga.),
Drew Carlson (Spring, Tex.), and McGowen didn't disappoint with the 2:59.55 B-Cut effort for second place to earn All-Conference distinction.
Bears men's swim & dive will now shift gears into the offseason, but Reice and a few other standout competitors from the weekend will keep this upcoming Thursday bookmarked to find out if they get to take a trip to Indianapolis for NCAA Championships.
