Virginia Captures Six Podium Finishes on Day Three at ACC Championships
GREENSBORO, N.C. – The Virginia women’s swimming and diving team and men’s diving team concluded the third night of competition at the ACC Swimming and Diving Championships on Friday (Feb. 22) at the Greensboro Aquatic Center with six podium finishes.
The Cavalier women are in second place with 867 points. NC State leads the field with 886 points, while Louisville is in third place with 766 points.
Nine Cavaliers advanced to the A finals in an event as junior Morgan Hill (Olney, Md.) again paced the team with an ACC title. Hill won her second event of the week and finished first at the conference championship for the sixth time in her career, winning the 100-yard butterfly by one-hundredth of a second. Hill captured a time of 51.01 to top the event and set a school record.
Two Cavaliers earned All-ACC honors in the 200-yard freestyle as sophomore Paige Madden (Mobile, Ala.) finished second with a time of 1:44.03, while redshirt junior Megan Moroney (Deerfield Beach, Fla.) placed third with a time of 1:44.61.
Moroney followed minutes later with the second-fastest time of the night in the 100-yard backstroke. She reached the wall with a time of 51.96, earning All-ACC honors for the swim.
In her first conference championship, freshman Alexis Wenger (Detroit, Mich.) placed second in the 100-yard breaststroke to finish as an All-ACC honoree. She dropped nearly two seconds off her entry time to record the third-fastest time in the NCAA at 51.31.
On the platform, senior Kylie Towbin (New Canaan, Conn.) recorded an All-ACC honor with a third-place finish. Towbin recorded a score of 236.85 in the five-round event.
Sophomore Marcella Maguire (Ridgefield, Conn.), Wenger, Hill and senior Eryn Eddy (Loveland, Colo.) closed the night with a third-place finish in the 400-yard medley relay. The four Cavaliers recorded a season-best time of 3:29.98 in the event.
“Today was another great day for the Wahoo women,” head coach Todd DeSorbo said. “There are too many exceptional performances to name them all as we had 22 opportunities today and all 22 of them made the finals with five more (individual) podium finishes.
“Morgan Hill winning the 100 fly by one-hundredth was intense. And that was her second title by a hundredth of a second. Alexis Wenger posting the NCAA’s fifth-fastest time in the 100-yard breaststroke by a freshman in the history of the NCAA, Megan Moroney pulling a podium double in the 200 free and 100 back, and Kylie Towbin scrapping for a podium finish on the platform are some highlights. The women competed today to put us in a position to contend for the ACC title. Tomorrow we battle to hoist the trophy.”
The Cavaliers had four additional swimmers advance to the A finals in an event.
Eddy and sophomore Kyla Valls (Miami, Fla.) raced in the top heat of the 200-yard freestyle. Eddy placed fifth, swimming a time of 1:44.77, while Valls finished seventh with a time of 1:45.74.
Joining Moroney in the 100-yard backstroke, sophomore Caroline Gmelich (Rumson, N.J.) and Maguire placed sixth and eighth, respectively. Gmelich recorded a time of 52.71, while Maguire swam a time of 54.01.
Sophomore Anna Pang (London) finished eighth in the 100-yard butterfly, recording a time of 52.75.