NEWMAC Student-Athletes Prepare for NCAA Women's Swimming & Diving Championship
The New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) will be represented by 16 athletes at the upcoming NCAA Women's Swimming and Diving National Championships.
2009 NEWMAC Champion Springfield College leads the field, sending seven athletes to the event. Wheaton is represented by four swimmers while MIT will send two to the national event. Clark, Coast Guard, and Wellesley will each be represented by one athlete.
Springfield, which claimed its ninth-straight NEWMAC title this season, will send five swimmers and two divers to this year's national event. Heading up the group will be three-time NEWMAC Swimmer of the Year Moira Price (Berkeley Heights, N.J.). After winning all three of her events at the NEWMAC Championship, Price enters the meet seeded number one in the 200 breast with the fastest time in the country to date at 2:16.42. Price will also swim the 100 breast, where she is seeded eighth (1:04.14) and the 50 freestyle, where she is seeded 13th (23.71).
NEWMAC Rookie of the Year, Kaitlin Reilly (Cumberland, R.I.), has qualified to swim in three individual events in the Championships. Reilly is scheduled to swim the 50 free, which she qualified for with a time of 24.19, the 100 free (52.78), and the 100 fly (58.20).
The third Pride swimmer who will swim in individual events will be junior Meg Cooney (Hershey, Pa.), who will swim both the 100 and 200 backstroke. Cooney earned All-Conference honors for first place finishes in both events at the NEWMAC championship. Cooney enters the 200 back seeded 14th with a time of 2:04.37 and is seeded 26th in the 100 back with a 58.12.
As for the Springfield divers, juniors Michelle Reggio (Brooklyn, N.Y.) and Meghan Kijanka (Methuen, Mass.) qualified to compete in both the one-meter and three-meter springboard competitions. Putting up the 7th and 9th highest scores in the 1-Meter board this season (11 dives) respectively, the two enter the competition with the 6th and 9th highest scores on the 3-Meter board as well. Additionally, freshman Courtney Keefe (Waltham, Mass.) was named an alternative in the diving competition.
Springfield had five different relay squads qualify for Nationals with its 200 medley relay team of Cooney, Price, Reilly, and Caroline Kosciusko (West Cornwall, Conn.) seeded 11th with a time of 1:45.70. The same four swimmers comprise the Pride's 400 medley relay, which enters seeded 13th with a time of 3:53.60. SC's 200 free relay of Price, Kosciusko, Jaclyn Van Waalwijk (Newtown, Conn.), and Reilly is also seeded 11th in the meet with a seed time of 1:35.65. The same four swimmers make up SC's 400 relay, which is ranked 19th with a qualifying time of 3:32.56. Springfield's 800 free relay also qualified and is seeded 16th with a time of 7:49.25.
Four Wheaton College women's swimmers have qualified to compete in a total of 11 events at the NCAA Division III Swimming & Diving Championship. The Lyon quartet is entirely comprised sophomores in Samantha Farrell (Reading, Mass.), Stephany Perkins (Monmouth, ME), Dania Piscetta (Belmont, N.H.) and Nicole Zais (Sudbury, Mass.).
Entering the NCAA Championship, Zais had posted the 11th-best 200-yard breaststroke time in the nation this winter while placing 20th in the 100 breast and 26th in the 50-yard freestyle. Piscetta was 25th in the 200-yard individual medley, tied for 30th in the 100-yard butterfly and stood 38th in the 100 free. Wheaton had the nation's ninth-fastest 200 free relay, 18th-ranked 800 free relay and 20th-best 400 medley relay, as well as 400 free and 200 medley relays that stand 21st and 22nd, respectively.
Representing MIT at the Championships will be senior Nicole O'Keeffe (Los Angeles, Calif.) and sophomore Amy Jacobi (Cranbury, N.J.). O'Keefe, who makers her first NCAA appearance, is seeded 21st in the 1650 free after taking second at the NEWMAC Championships in the event. She will also swim the 400 individual medley (seeded 26th, 4:45.24) and the 500 free (seeded 51st, 5:10.74).
Jacobi makes her second appearance at the national meet. She goes into the 100 Butterfly seeded 16th and will also swim the 50 free (24.19) and the 100 free (53.28) where she is seeded 39th and 55th respectively. Jacobi picked up first team All-NEWMAC honors in the 100-fly while finishing third in the 50 free and sixth in the 100 free at the NEWMAC Championships.
Eileen Garcia (New York, N.Y.), a freshman at Clark University achieved NCAA qualifying scores twice this season. Finishing in 3rd place on the 1-Meter board and in 4th place on the 3-Meter board at the NEWMAC championships, Garcia became the third diver in school history and the first since 1999 to qualify for Nationals. She set three new Clark records en route to the Minnesota meet, where she has the 21st highest score on the 1-Meter board (11 dives) and the 12th highest score on the 3-Meter board (11 dives).
Swimming for Coast Guard, sophomore Kimberly Shadwick (Campbell Hall, N.Y.) will represent her school at the national championship in the 200 Freestyle, the 1,650 Freestyle and the 500 Freestyle. At the NEWMAC championship, Shadwick won both the 500 and 1,650 free, but also captured the 200 freestyle Championship for the second straight season, breaking both school and NEWMAC Championship records.
Wellesley College senior diver Kate Sorenson (Bolton, Mass.) will represent the Blue at the upcoming NCAA National Championships. Sorenson makes her second NCAA appearance after taking 12th place on the 1-meter board and then 14th in the 3-meter competition in 2008, earning honorable mention All-America honors in both events. This season, Sorenson has emerged as one of the premiere divers in the country. Consistently ranking in the top three nationally, the senior was named NEWMAC Diver of the Year after taking top honors in both boards at the NEWMAC Championships.
The 2009 NCAA Women's Swimming and Diving Championships will be held from March 18-21 at the University of Minnesota's University Aquatic Center. Macalester College serves as the host.
Written by Katie Guynn, Wellesley College, 2009.
Copyright 2008 The New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference. All rights reserved.
