In the first home meet of the season the Pioneers swimming and diving teams came to impress and did exactly that this past Saturday in front of several parents and alumni.
The men’s team defeated Utah 168.5 to 111.5 for its second meet win of the season. The women’s team also defeated Utah 163 to 137, but lost to Arkansas 167 to 130. The win over the Utes is the first for the women’s team since November of 2005.
The men’s squad won nine individual titles and both relay’s, while the women’s won five individual events and also won both relay’s.
“Probably went better than planned. We went in as 18-point under dogs so we were kind of worried at first, but pretty much kicked their buts,” said senior Marcus Christianson.
Leading the way for DU was junior Blake Worsley who won the 200-freestyle with a time of 1:42.19 and the 500-freestyle in 4:42.06. Freshman Garth Summers won the 200-butterfly in 1:54.15, the 100-butterfly in 50.54 and the 400-Individual medley in 4:10.04. Junior Daniel Vollmer won the 100-backstroke in 50.91 and the 200-backstroke in a time of 1:52.48. Senior Marcus Christianson won the 100-breastsroke in a time of 57.62 and junior Nick Brunger won the 200-breastroke in 2:06.92.
The 400-medley relay team comprised of Vollmer, Brunger, Summers and Worsley won the event in a time of 3:25.34. In the 400-freestyle relay Utah and Denver’s team of Vollmer, Worsley, Stephen Pendleton and Scott Madaras both finished at 3:06.05.
The men’s team was without both of their divers for the meet due to injury.
Senior Kelsey Totura once again led the way for DU winning the 200-backstroke with a time of 2:02.57, freshman Grace Kittle captured the 100-breaststroke in 1:05.15 and also the 200-breastroke in 2:21.12 in her third career college meet. Sophomore Olivia Dean won the individual medley race in a time of 4:36.89, while freshman Katy Motsinger won the 100-backstroke in 58.47.
The DU relay team of Motsinger, Kittle, Totura and Hayley Ettleson won the 400-medley relay race in a time of 3:52.44.
The 400-freestyle relay also fared quite well for the Pioneers as they edged Utah 3:33.08 to 3:33.61.
Denver lost a lot of quality senior’s to graduation, but have been welcomed the freshman with open arms this season, “We actually lost a lot of good swimmers, but our freshmen cover all the areas that we need,” said Christianson.
He and the rest of the team have strong goals for the end of the season, “I would like for us to go undefeated in our dual-meets, for a couple of our guys to make NCAA’.”
The women next swim Friday, Nov. 2 when they travel to Fort Collins to take on Colorado State.
The next home meet for both men and women will be Nov. 2 when Wyoming travels to the DU pool.
