ASU Women’s Swim: Sun Devils earn first win over Washington State in dominant fashion

(Photo via Xavier Litman/WCSN)

ASU Women’s Swim made its return to Mona Plummer Aquatic Center Friday for its first meet of 2023. Competing against Washington State, the Sun Devils hoped to start the year with their first win of the season.

The clouds in Tempe couldn’t put a Damper on ASU’s shine as the Sun Devils (1-6) won all 14 events and defeated the Cougars (1-5) 206-56.

The Sun Devils saw standout performances from redshirt junior Lindsay Looney and sophomore Charli Brown. Brown earned multiple individual first-place finishes in addition to being a part of the winning 4×100-meter medley and 4×100 freestyle relays. Brown also dominated in the 100 backstroke, finishing with a time of 1 minute, 2.18 seconds.

Looney aided the Sun Devils’ victory with her speed in the 4×100 freestyle and the 4×100 medley relays as well. She also ended the day with a pair of wins in the 200 freestyle (2:00.94) and the 200 butterfly (2:08.81).

While Looney and Brown played key roles in the win, other swimmers like freshman Katherine Randall and redshirt sophomore Elli Straume, also contributed podium finishes. Randall and Straume took first and second place in the 800 freestyle with times of 9:02.08 and 9:13.39, respectively.

In order to get the win, the Sun Devils employed an altered mindset from their previous meets, according to ASU assistant coach Rachel Stratton-Mills.

“Today we just wanted to focus on racing,” said Stratton-Mills. “Get our minds off of times specifically and as a group, race. Look at a body next to us and see what we can do to beat people around us. They did an amazing job of that today.”

With meets against No. 3 Stanford and No. 11 California on the horizon, Stratton-Mills also acknowledged that the team has some areas that could use improvement, but overall they’re on the right track.

“Well, we still have some fine-tuning to do, and we only have forty days left of the season,” Stratton-Mills said. “So, this takes us back to practice to work on the fine-tuning details, the turns, the starts, and tempo in races…

“(I) just want to see more great races like we had. We have a lot of people doing amazing things, having the best times every time they race and improving constantly.”