Junior Jacob McCafferty and the freestyle relay team highlighted the Duke men's swimming and diving efforts in the second day of preliminaries at the ACC Championships.
The second day of the ACCs, hosted by the University of Maryland, featured the 200 IM, the 50 and 500 freestyle events and the 200 freestyle relay.
As a team, Duke sits in ninth place out of 11 teams with 54 points. The Blue Devils, who went 1-4 in ACC regular season competition, lead Boston College and Miami, neither of which Duke faced this year.
Florida State currently leads the four-day event, while regular-season champion Virginia sits in second.
McCafferty qualified for the bonus finals in the 200 IM with a career best time of 1:53.43, good enough for 23rd in the preliminaries. In the bonus finals, the junior posted a 1:54.36 time to maintain his 23rd position.
The 200 freestyle relay team swam a season-best 1:24.15 to finish ninth. The team was anchored by sophomore Ryan Packer, who swam a 20.67 split to bring the relay into ninth place.
Packer enjoyed individual success as well, tying his career-best in the 50 freestyle at 20.95-the best time by a Duke swimmer this season-but he just missed the finals cut.
Senior Andy Storm also set a career-best in the 500 freestyle, shaving .07 seconds off his previous best, but it was not enough to qualify for the finals.
Following McCafferty's lead, eight other swimmers improved their times in the 200 IM. Junior Kevin Arthofer finished less than a second away from qualifying for the bonus finals with a time of 1:53.92.
The ACCs continue Friday with the 400 IM and 100 events in butterfly, backstroke and breaststroke.
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