Swimming Teams Drop Openers to Washington
10/22/2002 12:00:00 AM | Swimming & Diving
Swimming Teams Drop Openers to Washington
10/22/2002
SEATTLE, Wash. ? In its first dual meet of the season, both the men's and women's swimming teams lost to Washington on Saturday, 150-112 on the men's side and 162-94 on the women's side.
Despite losing the opener, Head Coach Chuck Knoles was satisfied with his teams' efforts.
"Washington quite simply swam faster and was better prepared to perform than we were at this point in the season," Knoles said. "Our goals are down the road a bit, especially being such a young team."
The women's team won just two of the 14 events but finished positively by taking the last two events. Junior Carolyne Savini (Egg Harbour Twp., N.J./Holy Spirit) was the winner in the 200 individual medley with a time of 2:06.66, which qualified her for the Big East Championships in February. In the final women's event, the 200 freestyle relay team of Jenny Livingstone (Endwell, N.Y./Union-Endicott), Kristin Criner (Free Bryn Mawr, Pa./Radnor), Kelly Redcay (Reading, Pa./Wilson) and Ryan Redman (Pittsburgh, Pa./North Hills) placed first with a time of 1:39.23.
Many Big East qualifying times were reached, including Savini's times in the 200 IM, 0 backstroke (58.75 seconds), and the 200 backstroke (2:05.24). Also qualifying were Redman (1:06.51) and Cynthia Snyder (Murrysville, Pa./Franklin Regional) (1:07.69) in the 100 breaststroke, Amy Miteff (Wellington, Fla./Wellington) in the 200 butterfly (2:05.42), and Emily Colley (Pace, Fla./Pace) (5:01.96) and Nicole Ebert (Spring, Texas/Klein) (5:04.86) in the 500 freestyle.
On the men's side, things were a little closer as the Panthers won six of the 14 events. Junior Eric Limkemann (New Haven, Ind./Woodlan) won the 1000 freestyle with a time of 9:28.38, more than 11 seconds faster than the second-place finisher and also qualified for the Big East Championships in the event.
Four events later, Ken Shelhorse (Gaithersburg, Md./Damascus) won the 200 butterfly with a Big East-qualifying time of 1:53.44. Senior co-captain Mike Grube (Drexel Hill, Pa./Upper Darby) also qualified for the conference meet by winning two separate events, the 50 freestyle (21.31 seconds) and the 100 freestyle (46.82 seconds).
Shelhorse got his second win of the evening with a victory in the 200 backstroke. Shelhorse touched the wall in 1:51.77, beating Diogo Bezerra of Washington by a tenth of a second and qualifying for the Big East Championships. The Panthers had three swimmers qualify in the 200 back, including Shelhorse, Eric Bugby (Easton, Pa./Notre Dame), and Tommy Bird (Charleston, W.Va./Capital). Bugby finished with a time of 1:53.16, followed by Bird's 1:55.07. Bugby also qualified in the 100 backstroke with a second-place time of 52.93 seconds.
Limkemann earned his second victory in the 500 freestyle with a qualifying time of 4:32.87. Also making the Big East standard time was Adam Webber (Lebanon, Pa./Cedar Crest) with a time of 4:38.64.
"Heading out to Seattle for our first meet of the season was a tough decision. We wanted to get a Pac-10 team on our schedule and we wanted to begin to upgrade the level of competition," Knoles said. "I knew that it would be tough to take them on right off the bat after a long trip. But more than the loss, we took away from the meet the beginning of a new direction for both the women's and men's teams. We are learning how to do battle when the odds are against us."
The Panthers (0-1 for both teams) will have a home meets this coming weekend against St. Bonaventure on Friday, Oct. 25. The meet begins at 4 p.m. at Trees Pool.