Pitt
AT&T Winter Nationals
Panthers Well-Represented In Friday's Finals
12/5/2014 12:00:00 AM | Swimming & Diving
GREENSBORO, N.C. – After placing only one swimmer in the finals on the first full day of competition, five Pitt swimmers qualified for Friday’s finals to lead the Panthers charge at the AT&T Winter Nationals at the Greensboro Aquatics Complex.
“I was very pleased with the evening’s finals. We had some nice evening swims after a very tough day of preliminaries,” said head coach Chuck Knoles.
Seniors Kourosh Ahani and Luke Nosbisch, junior Blair Wegescheide and sophomores Zach Lierley and Kinga Cichowska all represented Pitt in their respective races for the second time during the day’s competitions following strong performances in the morning prelims.
Following the morning prelims, Knoles looked back on what his team had just accomplished and what they had to look forward to later that evening.
“Heading into tonight’s finals we have a bunch of kids swimming. We were very pleased with the morning prelim swims. It was fun to watch the kids get excited about swimming fast this morning and now those kids have a second opportunity to swim faster at the finals tonight at the National Championships. It’s very exciting for us.”
Lierley was the only swimmer to qualify for the A Final while the two women, Cichowska and Wegescheide were the only two to make the B Final. Nosbisch and Ahani were C Final participants.
Lierley was the first Pitt swimmer to punch his ticket to the finals, swimming a season-best and NCAA “B” cut time of 3:49.65 in the 400 IM to earn a spot in the A Final and secure a top-eight finish. That time was the sixth fastest of the prelims. In the night’s competition, Lierley placed seventh, finishing just a hair slower in 3:48.84.
In the 100 breast prelims, Cichowska was the 14th fastest swimmer in 1:01.36 and went on to duplicate her performance in the finals with the exact same time and finished 15th overall.
Pitt nearly had two swimmers qualify for the women’s 100 breast finals and had a third not far behind as all three women placed in the top-32. Senior Cam Dixon wound up as the first alternate (25th place) with her time of 1:02.44, while freshman Katie Fernander, competing in her first Winter Nationals, took 32nd with a season-best performance of 1:02.66.
Swimming in the 100 back, Wegescheide in the 100 back recorded the 13st fastest time in the morning with a “B” cut performance of 54.09 seconds. At night, Wegescheide settled for 16th after swimming the race in 54.39 seconds.
Coming off the 17th fastest time of the morning prelims with an NCAA “B” cut time of 48.21 in the 100 butterfly, Ahani bettered his performance later that night with a season-best showing of 47.90 seconds, dropping 0.31 seconds from his prelim time to take 18th place. Overall, his time from the finals was the 16th fastest of the evening. Ahani is the first Panthers swimmer to go under 48 seconds in the event this year.
“We saw some great swims across the board,” said Knoles. “It was nice to see Kourosh Ahani get under the 48 second barrier without shaving and not being fully rested for the meet. That was our goal to be under 48 seconds, so he did a nice job.”
Nosbisch was the final male to compete in the finals, earning a berth in the 100 breast C Final after posting the 20th quickest time of 55.00 seconds, an NCAA “B” cut, in the prelims. He eventually finished 22nd with a time of 55.09 seconds.
For the third straight night, the men put a relay team in the top-8 as Ahani paired with juniors Sean Heiden, David Sweeney and Sean Rhinehart to place eighth in the 200 free relay. Their showing was less than a second off the school record.
“We ended the evening on a high note having our men’s 200 free relay place eighth. Our time trial for the women’s relay that we did earlier in the day would have also been at about the same position had we made the cut.”
Earlier in the day freshman Emily Murphy set a Pitt freshman record in the 50 free after she led off the 200 free relay in the time trials with a time of 23.06 seconds.
“We are looking forward to a great last morning of the meet tomorrow. We have prelims in the morning and come back for finals at 5 p.m. and then jump back on the bus for Pittsburgh right after,” said Knoles.
Pitt concludes its time at the AT&T Winter Nationals with one more day of competition on Saturday, Dec. 6.
