COURTESY OF JOHN TRIEBEThe men and women of the swimming and diving team won a combined 18 of 26 events to overtake Illinois Wesleyan University in their fourth dual meet of the season at home Saturday, Nov. 15. The women won 153-84 while the men won 125-96.
Head coach Brad Shively was pleased with his athletes as the swimmers competed in events where they were less experienced and the young diving squad gained valuable experience.
“We didn’t have swimmers in their traditional events,” said Shively. “We had some kids who don’t normally swim backstroke get to do that. We put some in the 1000 who have not yet swam the 1000.”
“We got to swim races that we don’t regularly swim, so the meet was an opportunity to branch out and see what else we could be successful in,” said senior captain James Prescott.
Shively said that despite coming off perhaps the hardest training week of the season and racing in unfamiliar events, “It wasn’t a meet where we went into it planning to compare what we did last weekend to what we did this weekend. Instead we said let’s go out there and have some fun. Let’s try to get in some good races and be competitive. Cheer for each other, and let’s see what we can come up with. Overall I was very pleased. I thought it was a very positive meet.” The University’s men led the meet from the start, dominating in the 200 Yard Medley Relay. The team of juniors Jason Suszko and Steve DiLorenzo and sophomores Alex Antilla and Cory Zimmerman won in a time of 1:43.07.
The women, on the other hand, were out-touched by .04 seconds in the first relay but ended the meet with a convincing first place finish in the 200 yard free relay. The team of sophomores Jenny Scott and Nora Ames and juniors Su Wang and Sarah Goldberg won in 1:45.42.
Between relays, three athletes each claimed a pair of individual victories for the Bears. Sophomore Tracey Hendrickson won the 50 and 100 yard frees in 25.38 and 1:01.09 respectively.
Assisting the men were freshman David Stein and sophomore Mike Slavik. Stein won the 1000 and 500 yard frees in 10:33.70 and 5:04.47 respectively. Slavik won the 50 yard free in 21.80 and the 100 yard fly in 53.45.
The 100 yard fly was one of three events in which the University’s men went 1-2-3. Triebe and Suszko followed Slavik for 2nd and 3rd respectively in the 100 Yard Fly.
In the 200 yard free Triebe won in a time of 1:48.60 while Prescott finished second and sophomore James Eckstein finished third. In the 200 Yard Individual Medley Matson won in 2:08.96 while sophomore Craig Aubuchon took second and Zimmerman took third.
The women went 1-2 in three swimming events and 1-2-3 in both diving events. Junior Julie Heidbreder, senior Paloma Garner and freshman Emily Richmond placed in diving with Heidbreder winning the 1-Meter with 218.60 points and Garner winning the 3-Meter with 219 points.
The women were able to sweep the diving events with ease because Illinois Wesleyan had no female divers to enter. Nonetheless, Shively thought that fact cannot take away from how the women performed. The Bears have six female divers, three of whom are freshmen, and one freshman male diver.
Other winning performances on the women’s side included junior Brianna Krull’s 12:57.24 in the 1000 yard free and races by four sophomores. Ames and Scott won the 200 and 500 yard frees in 2:02.39 and 5:18.78 respectively. Amelia Stiles won the 100 yard backstroke in 1:03.80, and Allison Boettger was victorious in the 100 Yard Breaststroke in 1:10.33.
Shively considered one of the strongest races to be the men’s 100 yard free. Antilla went 49.64 to win in a personal best time.
“He did that in season, and that’s a very competitive time in Div. III,” said Shively. “Things like that were very surprising because I did not expect us to have times that were that strong.”
The teams will be back in action at the Millstone Pool for the Washington University Thanksgiving Invitational that begins at 10 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 22. However, the Bears’ current focus remains on the approaching mid-season meet, the DePauw University Invitational to be held Friday, Dec. 5.
“I think everybody is going to bring good swimmers to our meet,” said Shively.
The DePauw Invite may be yet another step up in competition. Shively said, “It is such a fast meet.” Shively also sees the meet as “an opportunity for our kids to post some national qualifying standards” and “a good opportunity to judge what we have done in the first half of the semester.”