The Seton Hall Pirates opened the 2019-2020 swimming season with a dual meet against Montclair High School. Montclair has been notoriously known as being rivals to the Pirates according to prior seasons. It was a very intense atmosphere at Montclair State University as both schools fought hard to get their first win of the season. The Pirates powered through as they got 9 first places out of 11 events.

The most notable swims of the night started with a win in the 200 Medley relay led by Jaeden Yburan ’21, Michael Pietrucha ’20, Joaquin Quezada ’21 and Jack Devilbiss ’21 with a time of 1:40.65. Captain Matt Prior ’20 and Yburan helped the Pirates tremendously as they won both of their individual events. Prior won the 200 free going 1:49.22 and also the 500 going 4:55.70. Yburan also helped gain his team points as he won the 100 fly going an astonishing 52.52 and the 100 back going 53.88. Fellow captain Pietrucha also stood out as he managed to edge out a first place victory in the 100 free going 50.49.

Connor Townson ’22 helped gain points for the Pirates as he won the 200 individual medley swimming a best time of 2:01.18 and another best time of 1:01.22 in the 100 breast. It was a very close meet between both teams but after a while, Montclair began to lead away for the win. The final event of the night was the 400 free relay where two of the three Pirates’ relays placed both first and third. The first place relay team was led by none other than Prior, Devilbiss, Townson, and Yburan.

Even though the Pirates shut out the final event of the night, it was still not enough to beat Montclair. Montclair won the meet with a score of 90-80 leaving them 1-0 and the Seton Hall Prep Pirates 0-1. The Pirates had a total of 4041 power points which was very impressive despite the loss. The Pirates seek to improve as they face Montclair again at the SEC/ECC Swimming Championships.