Pleasant Prairie, Wis. -- Four days after the conclusion of the CCIW Diving Championships in Wisconsin, the league's swimming programs have returned to the Badger State for the second portion of this year's conference championships. Wednesday marked the first of four-consecutive days during which the seven CCIW swimming squads will compete, although tonight's introductory slate saw the staging of just one race in each gender field, the 800-yard freestyle relay. A Thunder quartet came in second in the competition this evening to confirm Wheaton's second-place position in the team standings heading into Thursday's action.

Jed Ritchie, Zachary Kohoutek, Isaac Eilmes, and Sam Yonan owned the second-best seed time in the 800 free relay coming into Wednesday's race behind only the three-time defending champions in the event from Augustana College. The Vikings secured a four-year title sweep with an impressive 6:40.85 performance tonight that improved on their previous best time by nearly 12 seconds. The aforementioned Wheaton grouping registered a combined 6:57.29 mark to claim the runner-up spot on the podium, completing the event 5.11 seconds ahead of the Carthage College squad in third place.

Combining tonight's scores with the points earned by the Thunder men's divers last weekend, Wheaton is currently second in the conference standings with a total of 111. Carthage is the early pace-setter thanks to its diving prowess and leads the field with 171 points. Reigning CCIW champions Augustana are in third place on 99 points.

Event prelims are set for 10:30 AM with the finals starting at 6:00 PM on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at the Pleasant Prairie RecPlex.