BERKELEY - With plenty of new faces getting their first collegiate race action and a group of returners intent on setting the tone for the season to come, the Cal men's swimming team kicked off its 2016-17 campaign with a 172-52 dual meet victory over Pacific at Spieker Aquatics Complex.

Hosting their lone home dual meet of the fall, the Bears got started right away with a 1-2-3 finish in the 200-yard medley relay. Though a technical issue left the relays unscored for the day, Cal (1-0) kept right on rolling into the 1,000-yard freestyle where sophomore Nick Norman set the pace early and cruised home for a winning time of 9:12.93.

The 200 freestyle gave Cal fans a look at a pair of promising freshmen as Michael Jensen and 'Aukai Lileikis dueled to the finish. Jensen posted a time of 1:36.27 to edge his teammate and the duo battled again later in the day as Pawel Sendyk joined his fellow underclassmen to go 1-2-3 in the 100 free. Jensen took that race as well with a time of 43.22.

Freshman Andy Song picked up his first collegiate win with a victory in the 100 backstroke and junior Connor Hoppe, the defending Pac-12 champion in the 100 breaststroke, again showed his strength in that event with a good swim to earn his first win of the year. 2016 Pac-12 Newcomer of the Year Andrew Seliskar pulled away for a convincing win in the 200 butterfly and fellow Pac-12 champion of a year ago Justin Lynch claimed the 50 free to take the meet into its first break.

After fans were treated to an exhibition swim by 2016 Olympic gold medalist Tom Shields as well as Cal's 1-2-3 finish in the 100 free, sophomore Mike Thomas picked up a win in the 200 backstroke to highlight an impressive day for the Pennsylvania native. Senior Hunter Cobleigh outdueled Hoppe to win the 200 breaststroke and Norman made it a distance double with another convincing win in the 500 free.

Lynch earned his second victory in the 100 butterfly and Thomas closed the day's scoring out with the top time in the 200 IM. Lynch, Lileikis, Sendyk and Jensen combined to win the 400 free relay to finish the afternoon.

"The guys stayed invested in the meet all the way through. It's really easy to have a mindset that it's an early season competition, we're training through this but our guys took this meet seriously," said Cal associate head coach Yuri Suguiyama. "I thought they gave good attention to all of their races and I felt like they were generally very invested in it."

With the home portion of the fall dual schedule complete, Cal next turns its attention to the Pacific Invitational on Oct. 21-22. The annual Triple Distance Meet between the Bears and Stanford takes place Nov. 2 at Stanford and Cal wraps up its fall schedule from Dec. 2-4 with a trip to the Georgia Fall Invitational.