WILKES-BARRE, Pa. (October 18, 2018) — The King's College women's and men's swimming teams will open the 2018-19 season this weekend with two competitions. Friday, October 19, the swimmers head to Selinsgrove, Pa. to meet with Susquehanna University at 6:00 p.m. while the next day, October 20, they prepare for their home debut against Cabrini University at 1:00 p.m. at the Scandlon Pool.

Sporting 39 swimmers in total this year head coach Matt Easterday gets ready to lead the largest roster he's ever had, including these 18 men, to victory after coming off a school-best 9-2 dual-meet record that propelled him to being named Middle Atlantic Conference Men's Swimming Coach of the Year. King's finished sixth in the 12-team MAC Championships.

"Last year we had a lot of success, a lot of firsts with all the records and school history made but I won that award because of them." Said Easterday, "My team got me that award."

FREE
In the men's freestyle sprint, Dan Weekes returns along with Rhyce Hammaker, Chris Dionne, Randill De Asis, James Martin and Bryce Groshardt. Weekes was able to finish fifth in the 50-freestyle at the MAC Championships last year. Freshmen Thomas Montvydas and Alex Schwartz look to make an impact on a team full of heavy hitters.

Weekes, Groshardt and Hammaker were part of a gold medal in the 200-medley relay, fourth in the 400-medley and fifth-place in the 400-freestyle relay.

Returners Chris Soutter, Tyler Higgins and Andrew Johnson look to hold down the team in the distance freestyle where Soutter placed fifth in the 1650-freestyle with a school-record time of 16:37.21 at Championships last year.

BREASTSTROKE
Junior Hammaker will also partake in the style that he won the gold medal and broke a school-record (57.67) during the preliminaries at the MAC Championships 100-breaststroke. In addition, De Asis returns while newcomers Kris Boxter, Schwartz and Matt Lowry will see action as well.

BUTTERFLY
Third-year Dionne, Chris Boucher and second-year Martin return to compete and lead freshmen Shawn Parrott, Joel Williams and Montvydas in their first events as Monarchs.

BACKSTROKE
Sophmore Jason Yerger will swim the back along with returners John Kwasziur, Hammaker and Groshardt who will be joined by first-years Parrott and Williams.