Minnesota’s swimming team easily outdistanced Iowa State at the Minnesota Invitational on Nov. 21-23, but the meet loss didn’t stop the Cyclones from accomplishing their pre-meet goals.

The Gophers won the meet with 1611.5 points, while ISU had 833 in finishing second out of the five teams. Wisconsin placed third with 746 points.

Men’s coach Trip Hedrick said the meet went pretty much the way he expected it to. He said he knew Minnesota’s squad would be tough, and the team’s performance reassured him that the Gophers are one of the nation’s top 10 teams.

However, the top two teams used different strategies at the meet. Hedrick’s squad used the meet as a tune-up competition and a measuring stick for upcoming meets, while Minnesota used it as a “shaving” meet to record fast times to qualify for the next semester’s NCAA meet.

“We swam extremely well,” Hedrick said. “From top to bottom we were pretty good. We’re showing some real good depth.”

He said the relay teams, especially the medley swimmers, did very well. The 400-medley relay team grabbed second place, while the 200-freestyle relay, 200-medley relay and 400-freestyle relays all took third places. Hedrick expects them to receive national rankings.

Hedrick also complimented junior Martin Andersson’s performances at the three-day meet. Andersson set two “in-season” best times in the 50- and 100-freestyle races. His times in the events were 21.26 and 45.81, respectively. His finish in the 100 was good for fourth place.

“I was real happy with that,” Andersson said.

He said his individual success was only part of the larger team effort. He said probably 60 to 70 percent of the swimmers recorded season-bests over the weekend.

This team seems to be performing better at this stage of the season than the past two teams he has competed on, Andersson said. “We’re really, really focused on swimming.

“It went very well,” Andersson said. “I think we are looking very strong.”

He agreed that the team knew Minnesota would be tough to beat and aimed more at topping Wisconsin, a goal the swimmers accomplished.

He said the meet will serve as good practice for the Big 12 Championship meet, which is in the same format as the Minnesota Invitational.

The Cyclone men next compete in a dual meet at St. Olaf on Dec. 6.