ROLLA, Mo. – Missouri S&T will host the first of its two home meets Friday evening as part of a busy weekend of competition, as the Miners will take part in a pair of meets in a span of 24 hours against teams currently in the CSCAA national rankings.

The first of the two competitions will come when the 12^th-ranked Miners host third-ranked Delta State in a dual meet at the S&T Pool in the Bullman Multi-Purpose Building Friday evening at 6 p.m.  Friday's meet will also be the team's pizza promotion night, as the first 100 students will receive a free slice of pizza courtesy of S&T Corporate Club member Papa John's.

Following Friday's meet, the Miners and Statesmen will both head to St. Peters, Mo., on Saturday to participate in the Lindenwood Invitational that will bring four more nationally-ranked teams into the fold in second-ranked Indianapolis, fourth-ranked McKendree, eighth-ranked Drury and 10^th-ranked Lindenwood.

Friday's meet will be the second competition of the season for Missouri S&T, who took part – along with Drury and Lindenwood – in the Show-Me Showdown on Oct. 4 in Columbia.  At that meet, Marco Flores (San Pedro Sula, Honduras/SERAN Private Bilingual School) had the top finish among the S&T swimmers with a third place showing in the 100-yard breaststroke; his time of 56.80 seconds in that event is the fifth-fastest in NCAA Division II thus far in the 2019-20 season.

Aaron Taske (Fairfield, OH/Saint Xavier) has recorded the seventh-fastest time in the nation in the 100-yard butterfly of 49.79 seconds, while freshman Jay Mercer's (Kansas City, MO/Whitefield Academy) time of 1:55.06 in the 200-yard individual medley is the 12^th-fast in the nation.  Fellow freshman Connor Weidemeier (West Monroe, LA/West Monroe) had a time of 1:42.22 that currently ranks 13^th nationally in the 200-yard freestyle, while Josh Umrysh's mark of 57.81 seconds in the 100-breaststroke ranks 18^th and Colten Becker's (Overland Park, KS/Blue Valley Northwest) time of 46.84 seconds in the 100-yard freestyle is the 20^th-best.

S&T's 200-yard medley relay team that consisted of Mark Cavanaugh (Papillion, NE/Papillion-LaVista), Flores, Taske and Chris Betts (Katy, TX/Cinco Ranch) own the eighth-best mark nationally of 1:33.06, as does its 400-yard freestyle relay team of Becker, Weidemeier, Umrysh and Taske that posted a time of 3:08.06 in the opening meet.  The Miners' 200-yard freestyle relay team of Flores, Betts, Weidemeier and Becker has the 11^th-best time of 1:24.43.