No. 9 Florida Wraps Up Second Day of Competition at Auburn Invite

Saturday, February 8

Auburn, Ala.

All Day

Florida Gators

Auburn Last Chance Invitational

Freshman Tyler Watson edged out Brennan Gravley for a 400 IM win on Saturday night.

No. 9 Florida Wraps Up Second Day of Competition at Auburn Invite

Saturday, February 8, 2020 | Men's Swimming & Diving

By: Ryan Sosic

GAINESVILLE, Fla— The No. 9 University of Florida concluded their second day of swimming at the Auburn Invitational at the James E. Martin Aquatics Center on Saturday.

In total, Florida would pick up an event victory, four season-best swims and a pair of personal-best marks.

Tyler Watson led the Gators with a 400 IM finals victory, edging out teammate Brennan Gravley by less than a second. Watson (3:52.63) and Gravley (3:53.54) would both touch in personal-best times in the finals.

Additionally, the pair both improved on their morning prelim time. Gravley headed into the final with the best swim in the morning round, beating his previous best swim by seven seconds.

Advait Page joined the pair in the evening finals, posting a seventh-place finish. He would set his best time on the day in the prelims, tallying an effort of 4:01.80.

Ethan McCloud finished fifth in the preliminaries with a swim of 3:59.54, but did not compete in the finals.

Viktor Toth dropped .79 seconds off his 100 fly prelim swim, touching the wall in a fifth-place finals effort of 50.69, a new season-best.

A trio represented Florida in the 200 free finals, with Alfonso Mestre posting the best finish as the freshman registered a season-best effort of 1:37.23.

Lucas Kravchenko (fifth) and Drew Clark (ninth) rounded-out the finishers for Florida. In the prelims, Clark with notch a season-best swim of 1:40.73.

Ethan McCloud improved on a third-place finish in the 100 back prelims to post a runner-up bid in the finals. He secured the second-place nod with a swim of 49.74, .51 seconds faster than his effort in the prelims.

Kravchenko also competed in the event prelim, tallying a time of 52.57.

What's Next

Sunday will mark the third and final day of swimming at the Martin Aquatics Center.

The next time the Gators will be in the pool will right back in Auburn, with the 2020 SEC Championships taking place on Feb. 18-22.

Florida will look to extend their conference championship streak to eight straight, taking home the title every season since 2013.

Sunday Schedule