OCALA, Fla. – The Pacific swim and dive program makes the coast-to-coast trip for the 2026 CSCAA National Invitational Championship, hosted at the FAST Facility in Ocala, Florida from Thursday, March 12 to Saturday, March 14.

The Tigers will be sending a dozen swimmers from the men's team to compete in the annual meet across the three-day event.

While the Pacific men garnered a 2-4 record amidst a tough regular season schedule and finished fifth place at the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Championships two weeks ago, a couple records were broken by a pair of Tigers who will suit up once again.

Freshman Raphael Vanhecke notched a school record in the men's 200 IM at MPSFs with a time of 1:46.20, surpassing the previous record holder in that event, established by Mitchell Hopper from a season ago (1:46.49). Vanhecke will be competing in that race, along with the 200 free and 100 IM in Florida.

A Pacific record was broken for a second time during the MPSFs as sophomore Freddie Cumming turned in an outstanding performance in the men's 200 yard breaststroke with a record-setting time of 1:57.84, passing the top time in that event previously by Yahav Shahaf in 2017 (1:58.26). Freshman Cruz Lopez, who will also be competing at NICs this week, finished right behind Cumming in that race, beating the benchmark with a time of 1:58.20. Cumming and Cruz will both represent the Tigers throughout this week swimming a trio of variants of the breaststroke.

Senior Mattia Giurgevich will be a key swimmer to keep an eye on this week as well, given his performance last time at NICs. Giurgevich was crowned a champion of the 50 breast with a time of 24.39, which gave his team 20 points at the time.

Giurgevich would also collect a silver medal last year. The native of Limbiate, Italy notched second place in the 100 breast, clocking a time of 53.45 in that race.

Sophomore Nate Rasmussen, a standout freestyle swimmer during his breakout second-year campaign, will look to turn heads as he competes in the 50, 100 and 200 free across the three days. Rasmussen has accumulated three MPSF Athlete of the Week honors this year after strong performances in the pool in 2025-26.

The National Invitational Championships will be streamed live all three days on YouTube, which can be found here. The full championship central can be found here for all information.

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