Men’s swim team honors seniors, pushes through last few weeks of training before nationals in Arizona

Saturday, March 1

Lynchburg, VA

12:00 PM

Liberty University Club Sports

2025 Flames Invitational

Graduate Matt Davidson gets out to a fast start en route to winning the 50-yard backstroke, as he did in the 50 butterfly. (Photos by Katelyn Foelsch)

Men’s swim team honors seniors, pushes through last few weeks of training before nationals in Arizona

3/4/2025 2:14:00 PM | Men's Swimming

Photo Gallery

Liberty sent out seven seniors and social media coordinator Katelyn Foelsch during a special ceremony before Saturday's regular-season-ending meet against William & Mary at the Liberty Natatorium.

Gallery: (3-4-2025) Men's swimming Senior Invitational

Liberty University's men's swim team concluded its regular season with a Senior Day Flames Invitational meet against William & Mary on Saturday, sending its seven seniors out, surrounded by family, friends, and teammates, in a competitive atmosphere at the Liberty Natatorium.

"Honestly, this was a really good opportunity for us to give our guys one last chance to swim at home in an environment they are comfortable competing in … and to love on them and thank them for their time here," Flames Head Coach Heath Grishaw said.

Liberty dominated the Tribe, also a College Club Swimming competitor, in their final meet before the March 28-30 CCS National Championships hosted by Arizona State University in Mesa, Ariz. The Flames outscored William & Mary's men's team, 376-12, and even won the combined standings without any women's swimmers, 376-269.

Grishaw pushed his top swimmers by placing them in successive events with little recovery time.

"The second reason for this meet was to give our guys opportunities to race well with a short amount of time between events, so that when they go to nationals — where some of our guys could have back-to-back to-back swims — they're ready," he said. "This meet was meant to simulate that type of swim (schedule), where they would swim fast and then turn back around and do it again. We saw some good times from a lot of people. Some swam their personal-best times, and some made new qualifying time cuts."

Event winners for Liberty included graduate Matt Davidson in the 50-yard backstroke (24.15 seconds) and 50 butterfly (23.90), junior Whittman Brown in the 200 freestyle (1:44.30) and 200 individual medley (2:02.35), junior Dillon Delaney in the 100 IM (55.07) and 50 breast (27.27), senior Trent Kolter in the 100 fly (54.09), sophomore Byron Long in the 100 breaststroke (1:03.04), junior Maximus Phillipps in the 50 free (21.19), sophomore Thomas Hill in the 500 free (4:51.94), freshman Chaz Schuijt in the 100 back (53.58), and Paul Rasoumoff, a graduate spring transfer from California Baptist, in the 100 free (49.35).

The Flames also won the meet-opening 200 medley relay, with freshman Malachi Caballero (back), sophomore Kierro Stubbs (breast), freshman Aaron Hall (fly), and freshman Tommy Horton (1:40.76) and the meet-ending 200 free relay, with Brown, Phillipps, junior Benjamin Bizeau, and Delaney in 1:28.19.

Complete results are available online.

Grishaw expects the Flames to be ready to peak at nationals by the end of March, when they will be tapered in their training.

"We'd better see some records broken," he said. "This is the meet when we will see all (the work in practice come to fruition). We hope all the planets and moons and stars align, and we are going to need some divine intervention; we need to let the Lord take over there."

He said two-time defending national champion Purdue will be one of a handful of teams that will provide a formidable obstacle for the Flames to overcome.

"It's going to be a tremendous challenge, for sure, and more of an even fight for everybody," Grishaw said. "Purdue lost some guys from last year, and we lost a couple guys with Drew Baxter (the 200 back national champion as a freshman) stepping down from swimming. But we gained a couple of guys, and brought back (former team captains) Matt (Davidson) and (graduate) Carter (Helsby), as well as a transfer (Rasoumoff), who has made an impact in terms of going to a Division I school … and realizing that this is not that far off from what he experienced there. We are excited for what's to come."

He said Davidson, a four-time national champion (two individual races, two relays), has the potential to place at nationals, if not win as he has in previous seasons.

"Matt's going to be ready to go when it's time," Grishaw said. "He always, is. It's going to be a fight for him, too, but never count him out."

For the team, Grishaw is pushing the Flames in practice now before tapering them sometime after Spring Break.

"Speed, speed, speed, speed," he said. "We're going to keep training before coming down in volume in a few weeks, while still keeping them sharp."

He is looking for his captains and spiritual leaders to bring out the best in their teammates.

"Being unified as a team will be the key with 30 guys traveling and swimming," Grishaw said. "Nothing will set us back. We have to keep doing the right things day-in and day out, and then we'll be ready to go."

By Ted Allen/Staff Writer; Video edited by Noah Richter/Club Sports Video & Media Assistant