By BRENT STUBBS

Chief Sports Editor

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

BAHAMIAN Olympian Lamar Taylor closed out his collegiate swimming career at the University of Tennessee by inking his name on the Volunteers men’s 400m freestyle relay team at the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s Swimming Championships over the weekend.

As the meet came to a close on Saturday at the Weyerhaeuser King County Aquatics Center in Federal Way, Washington, Taylor swum a split of 41.02 on the second leg on the team of Gui Caribe (40.57), Nikoli Blackmon (41.35) and Jordan Crooks (39.36) as they touched the wall in a new NCAA championship record time of 2:42.30 to erase their own national record.

Matt Kredich, the director of swimming and diving at Tennessee, could hardly contain himself when he spoke about the feat.

“That 400 free relay title has been a long time coming,” he said. “There were six guys who competed all year to be on that relay, and when they compete, they make each other better. 

“The first three legs were fantastic, but to set it up for Jordan Crooks, who has redefined speed and redefined sprinting, nationally and internationally, to hand it off to him as his last swim ever, that was an exclamation point on a career that I’m still in awe of and one that is worthy of a lot of different honours,” said Kredich. 

It marked the first time Tennessee won the event since 1979 and gave the Volunteers its third NCAA title of the week - its most since having four in 1996. As a programme, the Vols now boast 49 all-time titles.

Taylor, 21, anchored the Vols to another title in the 200m freestyle in 1:12.84. Crooks, Caribe and Blackman competed in that order before Taylor brought it home for another triumphant performance.

Taylor also led off the 200m medley team of Kevin Houseman, Caribe and Crooks that clocked 1:20.50 for second place.

Taylor, a transfer from Henderson State, said he was thrilled to have been a part of history - again. 

“The performance was great, I was able to lower my best times in all of my events and we defended our relay NCAA record-breaking performance,” he said. “My best performance this week would have to be winning the B final in 100 free.” 

In that 100m free, Taylor was a third-place finisher in 45.51 as he trailed Crooks with another NCAA record-breaking performance in 39.83 and Caribe, who was second in 40.51 for q sweep by Tennessee.

In another individual event, Taylor was fourth in the 100m backstroke in 45.51 that saw his team-mate Harrison Lierz take the top spot on the podium in 44.40.

As a team, Tennessee ended up fifth in the team standings with 104 points, the highest finish for the Vols’ since placing third overall in 2001, improving on their sixth-place last year.  It was their first back-to-back-to-back top 10 finishes at the NCAA Championships since doing it from 1993-2001.

As for Taylor, his collegiate season and career might by over, but he said there’s still a lot of swimming ahead of him this year.

“My expectations for the rest of the season is to keep lowering my times and hopefully make a semi final or a final at World’s this summer in Singapore,” he summed up.

It would be his third appearance at the global competition, having swam at the short course World Championships in 2021 in Abi Dhabi, United Arab Emirates and in Melbourne, Australia. He also competed in the 2022 Commonweath Games in Birmingham, England and the 2024 Olympics in Paris, France.