Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Individual Feats Keep GU Hopeful

With their loss at the hands of George Mason this weekend, Georgetown’s swimming and diving teams capped the regular season with their worst records in recent history.

The men dropped a 139.5-95.5 decision to finish 0-10 overall while the women lost 112-95.5 to post a 2-9 record overall. In spite of the dismal numbers, however, the teams are celebrating historically successful, diamond-in-the-rough individual seasons.

In Saturday’s meet, five more Hoyas qualified for the Big East championships. “[The meet] certainly excelled my expectations,” interim Head Coach Steven Cartwright said.

“Our goal going into this meet was to give the kids who haven’t qualified an opportunity to do so and those people who have already qualified in their events another opportunity to focus on the events that they will be preparing for Big East championships. And that’s exactly what they did.”

On the men’s side, freshman John Deppe qualified with first-place times of 53.47 in the 100-yard butterfly and 1:56.92 in the 200yd butterfly. On the boards, diver Michael McWilliams qualified in the one-meter diving event with a score of 245.62. Freshman Brian Koh qualified with first-place performances in the 200yd breaststroke and the 400yd individual medley.

For the women, freshman Suzanne Waller qualified in the 400yd individual medley with a time of 4:45.36, and junior Megan aragakes met the conference championship criteria by swimming the 100yd freestyle in 55.33.

There are 24 Hoyas on the Big East competition roster ? the most athletes Georgetown has ever sent to post season competition. Last year, 20 members of the team qualified and 19 competed in the Big East championships.

“We’re taking a record number of qualifiers to the post season and we have more than one individual in scoring position,” Cartwright said, referring to freshmen Laura Stark and Laura Alito and sophomore Goran Bistric. “And if we’re able to achieve that with multiple individual scorers, that’s something this program has never done before.”

Stark enters the post season having qualified for seven events in the Big East championship: the 500yd and 200yd free, the 200yd and 400yd individual medley, the 100yd butterfly, and the 100yd and 200yd breaststroke. The phenomenal first-year’s tally is the greatest number of Big East events for which any swimmer has ever qualified in the past seven years for which detailed records are kept.

In addition to the Big East qualifiers, the Hoyas clinched several top finishes against the Patriots.

“Mason provided a great atmosphere for fast swimming,” Cartwright said.

Freshman Eric Mooney swam to first place in the 50yd freestyle in 22.40. The quartet of Mooney, Deepe, Bistric and freshman Wes Going won the 200yd freestyle relay with a time of 1:30.79. Stark and Alito brought home first-place honors in the women’s 500yd freestyle and the 100yd butterfly, respectively. Freshman Tara Powers took first in the 1,650yd freestyle, while sophomore Christina DiNapoli snuck off with the 100yd breaststroke and junior Caitlin Colling triumphed in the 200yd freestyle. Colling, Alito and freshmen Lindsay Vickroy and Emma Porteus prevailed in the 200yd freestyle relay in 1:40.89.

“Wins and losses are completely secondary to times and how well you swim and doing the things you need to do for the end of the year, which is obviously the most important,” sophomore co-captain Daniel Robinson said.

The 24 qualifiers now move on to the Big East championships, which take place Feb. 14-17 in East Meadow, N.Y.

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