(Photo: Rachel Phillips/WCSN)
The Sun Devil men’s swimming and diving team clinched an impressive win over Northwestern on Saturday, while the women fell short in front of a boisterous crowd at the Mona Plummer Aquatic Center.
In what was the Devils first meet of 2020, the No. 12 ranked men finished 155-143, with No. 21 women missing out on securing the win over the Wildcats by 31 points — the final score being 164.5-133.5
“I don’t feel bad about it, but I don’t think we just lit it up,” head coach Bob Bowman said. Bowman ultimately attributed the less from perfect performance to losing too many close races.
After constantly driven training over the holiday period, Bowman still had praise for all of his swimmers including freshman Julian Hill, who won the 500 free in a time of 4:29.36 at a crucial point in the meet.
“He had the swim of the meet by far,” said Bowman. “That’s the best swim he’s had this year, and he really stepped up, and that helped us get to where we could fairly comfortably win the meet.”
Despite being surprised that he was in the lead early on, Hill said he was determined to take out the race.
“I knew we were behind and it was just too close and I was like, the least I can do is just go out for him,” Hil said.
Zach Poti (48.71) took out the 100 back while Liam Bresette (1:38.10), Carter Swift (1:38.21) and Cody Bybee (1:38.85) all had a day to remember, securing a cleansweep in the 200 free.
Bresette (45.17) also took home third in the 100 free while Swift took top spot in a time of 44.06.
Swift (20.33) also managed to notch up second place in the 50 free in what was another Sun Devil clean sweep. Evan Carlson (20.17) touching first while Ethan Luc (20.62) was not far behind in third.
Carlson got his second win of the day in the 100 fly, touching the wall with a time of 47.20.
The men finished the day on a high, taking first and second in the 200 free relay.
“Every day we’re coming in and working, like even if we’re tired or it’s the end of the week, we’re just doing our best to crush it,” Carlson said.
The women continued the men’s impressive freestyle campaign finishing one-two-three-four in the 500 free. The quadfecta consisted of Emma Nordin (4:51.66), Erica Laning (4:59.16), Claire Nguyen (4:59.30) and Kendall Dawson (5:02.35).
Both Nordin (10:08.87) and Nguyen (10:10.72) backed up their performance and finished first and second, respectively, in the 1000 free.
“We’ve been training really, really hard, so going into it, I knew it was going to be tough for us,” Junior Camryn Curry said. “Overall I think as a whole team we did put up some really good swims.”
Some of those swims include Curry’s (23.06) 50 free win and the one-two-three finish she led in the 100 free.
“Those are the best in season times that I’ve been ever, so I’m happy with that,” Curry said.
Chloe Isleta secured first place in the 200 back while the women took out the 200 free relay.
Over in the diving pool, reigning Pac-12 Champion Youssef Selim finished first in both of the springboard events.
The women Sun Devils will look to put together a more complete performance next week when they are back in Tempe against Kansas for another duel meet, before heading to Stanford with the men’s swimming and diving team on Jan. 24.
