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The Andover Boys Swimming and Diving team celebrates a massive victory from Easterns.
Daniel Seong ’25 swam breaststroke at Easterns.
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Saturday 2/17 – Andover: 1st place
On Saturday, Andover Boys Swimming and Diving (4-0) won the Eastern Interscholastic Swimming and Diving Championships (Easterns) in Pennsylvania. The team scored a total of 599 points, maintaining a comfortable lead throughout the meet before securing the ultimate victory.
Oliver Feng ’25 described the exciting environment at Easterns, sharing how the team was elated at the win, particularly as a culmination of the team’s success after a season ridden with challenges.
Feng said, “The environment at Easterns was very exciting and encouraging, with everyone cheering each other on and supporting each other about the win. I think we’re all very grateful because this was a tough season because of a lot of factors that were out of her control such as injuries, sicknesses, and other issues that plagued our team. We were just proud that we could come together as a team and win Easterns and put up some pretty impressive performances.”
According to Jay Wei ’27, everyone on the team played an essential role in obtaining the victory at Easterns. Wei spoke about his experience as a first-time participant in the meet.
“Going into the meet, I felt sick on the ride to Easterns in Pennsylvania, which carried over to the full first day. However, once the meet started, I felt better. After our relay [was] disqualified on the first day, we were able to bounce back from that, and on day two, we kept our relays going. All the relay performances were really good. My individual events were on day two, and they went well. For the 100-[Yard] Backstroke, I ended up getting the [Junior] record, which made me pretty happy with my overall performance,” said Wei.
Despite being unable to compete in the pool, Oliver Staubach ’26 highlighted how he was able to still actively contribute to the team by providing moral support and physical assistance.
Staubach said, “Easterns was a very hype environment with a lot of good competition. I wasn’t able to swim because I got my appendix removed two weeks ago, which was kind of difficult for me. Although I wasn’t able to swim, I did cheer for everybody on the team and was helping coach everyone as well. I did my best to help people with their splits, warm-ups, and everything else, which was a great way I was able to connect with the team.”
Wei also emphasized the inspiring recovery journey of Andrew Kim ’24 and his excellent performance at Easterns.
“I want to highlight Andrew Kim ’24. He had a shoulder injury [at] the start of this season. He just joined back to practice around a month or two ago… It was awesome to see him bounce back completely and perform really well in his [100-Yard] Butterfly. His progression has been incredible, and I think he placed second or third in the [100-Yard] Butterfly with some really strong times,” said Wei.
Boys Swimming and Diving will jump the blocks once more against Phillips Exeter Academy on Saturday.
