WEDNESDAY'S RESULTS  I  CHAMPIONSHIP SITE

SHENANDOAH, Texas – The Kenyon College Lords didn't waste any time making their presence felt during Wednesday night's opening session of the 2017 NCAA Division III Men's Swimming & Diving Championship. Highlighted by a win from senior Arthur Conover, the Lords posted 53 points in the meet-opening 500-yard freestyle and jumped out to an early lead.

Conover not only won the 500, he did so in an NCAA record time of a 4:18.35. That topped the previous record of 4:20.60 set two years ago by Andrew Greenhalgh of Johns Hopkins University. Wednesday, Greenhalgh broke his old record, too, but his time of 4:19.66 wasn't quick enough to get by Conover, who ended a two-year streak of placing runner-up in the event. The NCAA individual event title was Conover's second. He took the 1,650-yard freestyle crown in 2015.

Teammates providing Conover with reinforcements was sophomore Robert Williams and freshman Connor Rumpit, as well as junior David Perez. Williams placed fifth with a time of 4:28.73, Perez was seventh in 4:30.41 and Rumpit claimed tenth place with a 4:27.86.

The Lords then extended their lead to 23 points over Emory University by placing three more swimmers within the top-12 finishers in the 200-yard individual medley. Senior Trevor Manz was the fastest of the group, taking fourth place in 1:46.95. Senior Ian Reardon claimed seventh place with a time of 1:48.83 and freshman Mick Bartholomew took 12th after stopping the clock at 1:49.94. They were all chasing Emory's Andrew Wilson, who won with an NCAA record time of 1:44.18.

The results of the next event, the 50-yard freestyle, knocked Kenyon from the top of the standings. Emory had three finalists, including race-winner Oliver Smith, who combined to tally 33 points. That gave the Eagles a total of 95 points on the evening and put them in first place, ten points ahead of Kenyon, which had no finalists in the race.

The day-one Emory lead increased to 32 points over Kenyon after the Eagles ended Wednesday's competition by winning the 200-yard medley relay in an NCAA record time of 1:26.14. Kenyon didn't get a chance to challenge that because the Lords raced in the consolation final. They did, however, win that race to claim an overall ninth-place finish in a time of 1:29.26. That Kenyon quartet consisted of Ben Baturka, Manz, Jon Zimdars and Carpenter.

At the end of the night, Emory counted 135 team points to Kenyon's 103. John Hopkins sat in third place with 65 points. Denison University was fourth with 63 points and Washington University in Saint Louis was fifth with 59.

The Lords, as well as the rest of the field, will get back at it tomorrow for the second day of the four-day championship. Preliminaries kick off at 10 a.m. CST and finals get underway at 6 p.m. CST.