Judging by his soft-spoken and humble manner, you may not know how great the past three weeks have been to sophomore swimmer Greg Grewal.

He first finished top-16 in all three of his individual events at Patriot League Championships, which included a pair of fourth place finishes.

He has consistently proven his versatility and talent for Lafayette swimming so this performance was foreseen. But what he did not expect to do was compete at a level that would put him in the same category as past Lafayette swimmer and 1992 Olympian, Andrew Rutherford ‘94.

Rutherford represented the Hong Kong Olympic Team in the 1992 games in Barcelona. His name still stands on the Ruef Natatorium record wall. He was the first and last Lafayette swimmer to achieve NCAA qualifier – until Grewal came along.

Grewal beat Rutherford’s 200-yard breaststroke school record and also obtained his long-standing goal of reaching the NCAA Division I B cut in the 100-yard breastroke.

His 55.0 second time beat the qualifying standard of 55.39 and is second in school history behind Rutherfurd’s 54.44. He then went on to improve that time to 54.85 in the finals.

Achieving A-cut standards means one is automatically invited to NCAAs. After the NCAA governing body counts the number of A-cut qualifiers, they then start inviting select B cut qualifiers. Grewal will most likely not be invited to swim in the meet.

“Getting the B cut was one of the most satisfying swims of my life,” he said. “Whenever I was stressed out about swimming, my coach, Jim Dailey, would always tell me to look at the end goal…‘remember the B cut’.”

And the rich get richer. Grewal then went on to achieve Patriot League All-Academic Team this week. He explained how he balances his time:

“Being an athlete really forces me to prioritize my time and academics – sometimes it’s really tough to balance the workload of being a chemical engineer and swimmer – but I think I have found what works best for me,” the Downingtown, Pa. native said.

Grewal can now look forward to next season and new goals.

“Although I am happy with my performance, I do wish that I could have gone a little faster in the 100 and 200 breaststroke,” Grewal said. “I was about four-tenths of a second off from the school record in the 100 and just missed breaking two-minutes in the 200 by six-tenths of a second – being that close makes me excited for next year to start because I already know my goals”.