Swimming teams compete in final dual meets before UAA

Gadiel Rosenblut | Staff Reporter

During a busy weekend of back-to-back double dual meets, the Washington University men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams battled fatigue to combine for three wins and five losses against NCAA Division II opponents.

On Friday, both Bears’ teams defeated Lindenwood University-Belleville but fell to Lindenwood University in Maryland Heights, Mo. The following day, the women’s team again split duals, topping Lewis University and losing to the University of Indianapolis, while the men’s team fell in both matchups in Indianapolis.

For the women, it was the second straight weekend with back-to-back meets and the third meet in eight days for the men. Although the team won’t have to compete again until the UAA Championships on Feb. 11, a packed regular season in the last few weeks made fatigue a factor this weekend, according to head coach Brad Shively.

“We knew that they’d be tired, and we even talked about that after the meet last night. You’re supposed to be tired when you get back at 10:00 at night and then you’re on a bus at 7 in the morning traveling four hours to Indianapolis to swim against really good teams,” Shively said. “Our conference championships are also like that. You have three days in a row where you have to be great.”

For that reason, this weekend’s meets served as a preview of what is to come in February.

“Hopefully it gave us some realistic preparations for our upcoming meets that are the biggest meets of the year for us, and they’re going to have to battle through fatigue. They did a really good job this weekend,” Shively said.

For the women’s team, junior Kristalyn McAfee raced to first place with a time of 2:12.85 in the 200-meter individual medley on Friday while junior Sophie Gan won the 200 breaststroke in 2:22.18. The 400-free relay team consisting of senior Sara Taege, sophomore MariMac Collins, and freshmen Niamh O’Grady and Fiona Hon finished in second place with a time of 3:36.72.

On Saturday, the women’s team had five first-place finishers. Junior Amanda Stadermann took home first place in the 200 butterfly (2:10.70), freshman Nicole Zanolli swam to first in the 500 freestyle (5:10.13) and Hon won the 100 butterfly (1:00.47). In the 200-free relay, a team of junior Katie Anderson, Collins, McAfee and O’Grady was victorious in the 200-free relay (1:39.36). Freshman Laura Barber triumphed in the one-meter diving event.

On the men’s side, sophomore Justin Morrell led the men’s team on Friday, earning first place in the 50 freestyle (21.10). The next day, Morrell swam with fellow sophomore Reese Freirichs, junior Reed Dalton and freshman Ross Brown and placed third in the 200-medley relay (1:35.55). Dalton swam to the best finish of the day for the men’s team with a second-place performance in the 100 butterfly (50.94).

“We don’t swim them because they’re easy or we expect to get a win; we want to go against some pretty tough talent to get us prepared for UAAs,” Dalton said.

As the Red and Green prepare for the UAA Championships, Shively is focused on the team working out all the small race details and kinks, as well as getting some rest.

“This is a good opportunity to put finishing touches on race strategy and really on our fitness as well. We’ll continue to work on some aerobic fitness and a lot of anaerobic fitness, but a lot of the details have to be a focal point of our practices right now,” Shively said. “We’ll certainly start to rest them and give them an opportunity to be fresh and be at their very best at the UAA Championships.”

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