Waterville, ME
2/20/2026
The Colby Men's Swimming and diving team started off the first two days of the NESCAC Championship meet in a strong way with many school records falling. A big highlight was
Brandon Xiong winning the NESCAC championship in the 50 Backstroke by almost a full second,  The meet began on Thursday night with the 800 Freestyle relay where the Mules started off with a 7th place finish in a time of 6:44.83. With this swim the team of
Amaan Siddiqui,
Alex Ruckel-Bekefi,
Brendan Kirberger and
Brandon Morrison broke the Colby school record. The B relay of
Todd Siekman,
Breacan Shea, Cole DiPietro and
Noam Reinhorn placed 18th and swam the 9th fastest time in school history. Siekman's leadoff time of 1:42.32 was also the 8th fastest 200 Freestyle in school history.
On Friday the team came out strong again in finals with the team of
Brandon Xiong, Morison,
Ethan Chang and Siekman placing 6th in the 200 Freestyle Relay in an NCAA 'B' time of 1:21.29. This time is also 4th in Colby swim history. The B relay of Siddiqui,
Michael Fiechter,
Charlie Jacobs and
Alexander MacLennan swam to a 17th place finish and the 15th fastest performance in school history.
Starting the individual events
Shepard Kerscher got 16th in the 50 breaststroke. His time from prelims, 25.80, broke the 1st year record for the event. Also picking up points for the Mules were
Noam Reinhorn who got 21st and
Henry Stimson who got 24th. The next event, the 50 Butterfly also saw the 1st year record being set by Ruckel-Bekefi where he finished 7th. His time from prelims of 21.93 is the fastest ever swum bu a Colby first year and the second fastest in school history
Skylar Yoham also placed 13th with the 5th fastest performance in school history (23.72) and Chang placed 23rd in the event.
The records kept on falling as Kirberger swam the 500 freestyle where he placed 4th over all and broke the oldest standing record in Colby swimming history. His time of 4:30.84 set both the Colby Swimming and 1st year records and was also another NCAA 'B' cut. Following Kirberger, Xiong won the 50 backstoke (22.01) and did so in a school record setting time. Stimson also scored in his second event of the night as he got 16th. MacLennan had a great swim in the 200 IM (1:51.69) and scored in 17th place. For the final individual event of the night, the 50 Freestyle, Morrison finished in 13th with the 7th fastest time (20.80) in Colby history and Siekman finished 21st with the 9th fastest time (20.92) in Colby history.
The final event of the night, the 400 Medley relay saw Xiong lead off with a school record in the 100 Backstroke (49.41.) He was joined by Kerscher, Ruckel-Bekefi and Siekman to swim the 3rd fastest performance in school history as they placed 9th over all. The second relay of Stimson, Reinhorn, Yoham and Chang placed 18th with the 11th fastest time in the Colby books.
Colby sits in 9th place after 2 days of competition but are only 45 points out of 6th. The next two days will see some great competition and the Mules look forward to continuing their great performances and many more best times.
