In the opening meet of the season, the Washington University men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams fell short to NCAA Division I Saint Louis University on Friday.

The Wash. U. men’s and women’s teams started off strong, winning a combined four out the first five events, but the women’s team couldn’t keep pace, losing 112-131, while the men’s team lost 99-138 to the Billikens.

Freshman Michael Lagieski swims the 200-yard breaststroke in a dual meet with DePauw University on Nov. 2, 2013. Lagieski placed first in the men’s 100 breaststroke over the weekend as the Bears swept the top three spots of the event.

Regardless of the score, Coach Shively noted the importance of getting a chance to see his team in action, even if it came after only a few weeks of training.

“It was an early season meet, so we’ve only been in the water for less than two weeks, so it was an opportunity to see us in a little different light,” Shively said. “I thought we learned a lot of things about ourselves, probably a lot of things that we know we’ve got to do a lot better, but that’s completely to be expected this early in the season.”

The women’s team, who defeated SLU in last season’s opener, won five out of 13 events. Junior Kristalyn McAfee led the way by winning three events, including one relay. McAfee placed first in the 200 freestyle (1:56.22) and the 100 freestyle (54.05). She was also part of a first-place 200-free relay (1:39.48) that included senior Sara Taege, sophomore MariMac Collins and freshman Fiona Hon.

“I knew that—looking at who was on our relay—that together we would be able to win the event, so that’s what I told them: ‘we can do this, so let’s just win this because it’s one of the things we’re really good at.’ We got a lot of sprinters on the relay and we were ready to win it,” McAfee said.

On the men’s side, the Bears won the opening event, the 200-medley relay, as they took four out of 13 events on Friday. Sophomore Justin Morrell anchored the winning relay (1:33.88) that included fellow sophomore Michael Lagieski and juniors Kaisen Yao and Reed Dalton. Lagieski also placed first in the men’s 100 breaststroke event (58.10) that featured a Wash. U. sweep of the top three spots with sophomores Reese Frerichs (58.75) and Mathew Liu (59.74) finishing second and third, respectively. The men also took top spots in the long distance races as senior Zane Turpin finished first in the 1,000 freestyle followed by sophomore Andrew Ellison in second place. Ellison later edged out Turpin in the 500 freestyle as they again claimed the top two spots in the race.

“I think the team did really well for this point in the season. I know that even though we lost the overall, we’re only two weeks in,” Ellison said. “We’re super excited for whenever we get into the actual season because I think we’ll do really well.”

The meet also featured two first-place individual finishes by freshmen. Nicole Zanolli took first place in the 1,000 freestyle (10:40.46) by almost four seconds while Niamh O’Grady won the 100 backstroke (59.32).

Looking forward to the rest of the season, Shively emphasized that conditioning would be the focal point for the team.

“General fitness is really what we’re working toward right now,” Shively said. “We’re trying to work to be as conditioned as we possibly can.”

The Red and Green will have less than a week to train for their next meet as they hit the road for the Show-Me-Showdown at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Mo. on Friday.