Story Links
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. The Virginia swimming and diving teams, fresh of season-opening victories at South Carolina and Clemson last weekend, welcome in-state rival Virginia Tech for a dual meet beginning at 5 p.m. Wednesday at the Aquatic and Fitness Center. Diving events will begin at approximately 3:30 p.m. and live stats will be available online at VirginiaSports.com.
“It is almost a cross-country mentality, but we are going to have to swim in a pack,” Virginia head coach Mark Bernardino said. “All of our swimmers have to be on the front edge of all the races, none of them can fall behind. We have to compete with the early speed that Virginia Tech has and we cannot combat it with back-half speed. We have to have pretty aggressive front-half swimming in our races.”
The Cavalier women, ranked 10th in the latest CSCAA poll, defeated South Carolina 163-132 and Clemson 169-131 over the weekend. Virginia went 1-2-3 in three events against the Gamecocks and third-years Mei Christensen (100, 200 back) and Katherine McDonnell (100, 200 breast) each picked up two individual wins. Christensen then reached NCAA B cuts in both the 100 and 200 backstroke events against the Tigers and was a three-event winner with a victory in the 200 IM. McDonnell also won both breast events on Saturday against Clemson.
Virginia Tech, ranked 23rd in the poll, is coming off victories over NC State and West Virginia at home last Saturday. Senior Sara Smith helped lead the way, assisting in a first-place finish in the 200 medley relay and helping break the War Memorial Pool record in the process. Individually, Smith captured the 200 free crown at the opening meet in 1:50.31, and later in the meet, broke the 200 IM War Memorial Pool record. Smith, who previously set the mark in 2005 with a time of 2:04.62 in 2005, finished the race in 2:03.91 to win the event.
The 15th-ranked Virginia men also beat South Carolina (165-124) and Clemson (189-105) last weekend. Virginia finished 1-2-3 in three events, including the 1000 free, 200 free and 100 breast, Friday against USC. Second-year Scot Robison also claimed the 50 and 100 freestyle events. Against the Tigers, third-year Eric Olesen and fifth-year Ryan Hurley were each three-event winners. Olesen won the 100 back (49.68), 100 fly (49.95), and was a member of the winning 200 medley relay team. Hurley won both the 100 breast (56.96), and 200 breast (2:01.79) and was also a member of the victorious 200 medley relay team along with teammates Peter Geissinger and Scot Robison.
The Tech men defeated the Wolfpack and Mountaineers to open the season last weekend. The 200 medley relay team which included freshman Charlie Higgins, junior Jonathan Huss, senior Ian deToll and sophomore Stephen Hawkins broke the 200 medley relay record by .26 seconds, touching at 1:30.69. Additionally, the 50 free event was won by deToll, who crossed the line in 20.90.