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With a new academic year around the corner, Swansea University and its sports teams celebrated their highest-ever finish in a British Universities & Colleges Sport (BUCS) season.
At the end of the 2018-19 academic year swansea finished in 18th place, climbing 14 places from their standing in 2017-18.
BUCS delivers more than 50 sports to almost 160 member institutions - including some further education colleges - comprising a busy league programme of over 5,800 teams and over 120 championship events every year. Swansea University’s previous highest finish was 25th, which has been achieved on three occasions.
The season saw some notable achievements along way, including the men’s rugby team securing promotion to BUCS Super Rugby – the highest level of university rugby – following a thrilling 32-28 victory over Nottingham Trent back in April.
Meanwhile, the men’s lacrosse team stormed their way to Premier promotion with a 23-2 home victory over surrey in the second leg of their play-off. Both the hockey first teams topped their tables whilst american football achieved an impressive semi-final finish in the National Championship.
In total, there were 16 league winners and nine promotions for teams across a variety of sports including rugby, lacrosse, golf, hockey, football, table tennis and badminton.
In terms of silverware, lacrosse, boxing, netball, mountain biking, badminton, surf, rugby, futsal, football, sailing (yachting) and korfball were all successful for Swansea University, while there was a men’s and women’s double success in badminton in the BUCS Western Conference Cup. Windsurfing also bought home team gold with jiu jitsu securing bronze medals in their men’s championship.
On an individual level, Emily Williams claimed a gold medal at BUCS surf, while Lucy King secured a third-place finish in judo, bagging herself a place at EUSA 2019. The swimming club provided numerous medals at both the long and short course championships with notable performances from Liam White, Lewis Fraser and Alex Rosser.
Robbie Carrick-Smith led the medal count at the athletics bucs outdoors, earning himself a silver in the ambulant discuss and bronze in the ambulant shot put, while Ross Gwenter fought his way to a heavyweight silver at the boxing championships.
Meanwhile, Emily Tillet cycled to 500m track bronze and crit gold, while rounding up the year James Hayday bought home the experienced barebow silver in the BUCS outdoor archery championships.
Charlotte Peters, sports development coordinator at Swansea University said:
“It has been a hugely successful year for our BUCS sports and our 18th place finish is testament to all their hard work, commitment and the talent here at Swansea University.
“There are far too many outstanding performances from 2018-19 to mention them all - from Wednesday league triumphs, to championship successes and stand-out individuals.
“We are extremely proud of what has been achieved this year and we are looking forward to what next season brings.”