Nike Cup Recaps: Day 1

Senior Christine Wixted broke her own school record in the 200-yard individual medley and classmate Nick McCrory led the field in the men’s 3-meter springboard diving competition as Duke opened action at the 2013 Nike Cup Invitational Thursday at North Carolina’s Koury Natatorium.

The Blue Devil women stand second out of seven teams after one day at the three-day meet with 213 points while the men’s squad is fifth of six teams with a total score of 139.

After surpassing the NCAA provisional time standard during Thursday morning’s 200 IM preliminaries with a 2:00.08 swim, Wixted dropped time in the evening session, tapping the wall at 1:58.60. That performance earned her a first-place finish and a new program record. Freshman Bradley Cline (1:50.42) and senior Hunter Knight (1:50.78) scored for the Duke men in the same event, placing sixth and eighth, respectively.

The women’s 50 freestyle ‘A’ final saw a pair of Blue Devils surpass the NCAA provisional standard in the event as senior Lauren Weaver took third in 22.91 and rookie Maddie Rusch was fourth in 22.92. In the 500 freestyle, freshman Brittany Friese scored in 11th place (4:54.43), as did sophomore Kiera Molloy in 16th (4:59.81), and freshman Kaz Takabayashi paced the men with a 17th-place finish (4:33.50).

McCrory recorded his third win of the season in 3-meter diving, collecting an NCAA Zone Diving Championships qualifying mark and season-best score of 477.65. Freshman Cole Plambeck came in fourth at 353.10 and sophomore Deon Reid took fifth with an award of 350.25. Meanwhile in the women’s 1-meter competition freshman Kirby Quinn surpassed the Zones standard at 268.30 and sophomore Kendall McClenney finished right behind her in fifth at 267.00.

The women’s 200 freestyle relay of Weaver, Rusch, sophomore Chelsea Ye and Wixted placed third at the beginning of the evening with a season-best time of 1:32.18. The Blue Devil men were sixth in the same event, while the women’s 400 medley relay rounded out the night with a third-place performance (3:42.78).

The Nike Cup Invitational continues Friday with preliminaries getting underway at 10 a.m. and finals at 7 p.m. Men’s 1-meter diving and women’s 3-meter diving will take place during the afternoon in Chapel Hill.

The North Carolina men's and women's swimming and diving teams utilized their tremendous depth on day one of the 2013 Janis Hape Dowd Nike Cup to build sizeable leads in both team competitions.  The championships, an annual event at Koury Natatorium since 1986, continue Friday and Sunday with preliminaries at 10 a.m. and finals at 6 p.m. each day.

 

Led by two relay victories and individual event triumphs by Stephanie Peacock and Hannah Lincoln, the Tar Heel women are out fast in the meet heading into the next two days.  Carolina leads with 496 points, more the double second place Duke with 213 points.  NC State scored 192, East Carolina 184, Navy 73, Old Dominion 71 and Georgia Southern 11 on the first day of competition.

 

UNC's men won only one individual event on the day but its numbers in championship finals of events proved more than adequate to almost double up second-place NC State in the team scoring race.  Carolina has 406 points followed by NC State with 227, Navy with 196, East Carolina with 152, Duke with 139 and Old Dominion with 89.  It was redshirt sophomore Dominick Glavich who picked up UNC's only win of the day, seizing a come-from-behind victory in the 200-yard individual medley but he had plenty of help from his teammates.

 

"We love hosting this meet, the Janis Hape Dowd Nike Cup, and it was great to have Janis here watching the events tonight," said UNC head coach Rich DeSelm.  "We swam well and we dove well.  Altogether, we had a very good day.

 

Carolina started off the evening with a tight victory in the 200-yard freestyle relay as the unit of Sarah Hitchens, Hannah Lincoln, Ally Hardesty and Lauren Earp touching first in 1:30.52, a half-second ahead of the top NC State relay team.  It was role reversal for the two rival schools in the men's 200-yard freestyle relay as the NC State four-man unit took top honors in 1:18.97, edging the Carolina team of Logan Heck, Nic Graesser, Sam Lewis and J.T. Stilley by .37 of a second.

 

Next up was the 500-yard freestyle where UNC swimmers finished 1-2-3-4-5, led by Stephanie Peacock's NCAA "A" qualifying time of 4:36.40.  That time was just seven-tenths of a second off her own Nike Cup record.  Emma Nunn placed second in the event after going a career best time in the preliminaries (4:42.79) to earn the top seed going into the finals.  Danielle Siverling, Meredith Hoover and Annie Harrison rounded out the top five.

 

"Stephanie Peacock put together a very nice 500 freestyle.  I think it was 4:36 low so that will be very competitive (nationally) after the next week or two of swimming," said DeSelm.  "She feels good about it and we also had Emma Nunn doing a career lifetime best and several other swimmers going fast.  There are really just too many names to mention."

 

Thomas Duvall of Navy claimed top honors in the 500-yard freestyle on the men's side with a time of 4:22.51.  Carolina's J.T. Stilley garnered the runner-up spot in 4:23.45 while Carolina's Brad Dillon and Josh Beals came in fourth and fifth.

 

Christine Wixted of Duke was the winner of the women's 200-yard individual medley as she clocked a time of 1:58.60.  UNC swimmers placed second through sixth in the event with transfer Hannah Runyon-Hass claiming runner-up status with a time of 2:00.56.

 

North Carolina's Dominick Glavich captured the men's 200-yard individual medley in a time of 1:48.20, catching East Carolina's Rokas Cepulis in the final five yards of the race to win by .06 of a second.  Tar Heels Eugene Tee, Patrick Myers and Alex Gianino finished 3-4-5.

 

Sophomore Hannah Lincoln was at the top of the podium in the women's 50-yard freestyle as she touched in 22.86 seconds, just .04 of a second ahead of Lauren Poli of NC State.  In the men's 50-yard freestyle Old Dominion's Sidni Hoxha took first place with a Nike Cup record of 19.44 seconds, breaking Tennessee's Renato Gueraldi's mark which had stood for 11 years.

 

Carolina's 400-yard medley relay teams for women finished 1-2 in the event.  The "A" relay of Carly Smith, Katie Rechsteiner, Sarah Koucheki and Ally Hardesty touched first in 3:38.06.  There was a pitched battle for first place in the men's 400-yard medley relay where just .44 of a second separated first place NC State and second place Carolina.

 

Old Dominion and Duke each won a diving event on Thursday.  ODU's Rachel Eckert took first place in the women's one-meter diving with 294.35 points while Nick McCrory of the Blue Devils took first place in men's three-meter with 477.65.  Tar Heel divers were 2-3 in both events with Emily Schmidt and Erin Purdy doing so in the women's one-meter and Jack Nyquist and Ozzie Moyer notching the 2-3 spots in the men's three-meter competition.

 

"Our relays are ahead of last year and we just had a team meeting and we asked anyone who had a career lifetime best or a career best diving score stand up and we had a lot of people stand up, a good dozen or more having accomplished that here today," said coach DeSelm at the conclusion of the evening.  "The team is very enthusiastic about today's results and we are eager to teach them about multiple day swimming.  It takes a lot of juice to do this three days in a row, prelims and finals.  This is a great setting to set that up for February and March."

The NC State swimming & diving team completed the first day of action Thursday at the 2013 Jade Hape Dowd Nike Cup Invitational hosted by North Carolina at the Maurice J. Koury Natatorium.

 

The 14th-ranked men’s squad sits in second place through the first day of competition with 227.0 points, while the 23rd-ranked women’s squad is in third place with 192.0 points. UNC sits atop the leaderboard on both the men’s and women’s side.

 

The men’s 200 freestyle relay team composed of Andreas Schiellerup, Jonathan Boffa, Simonas Bilis and David Williams captured first place with a time of 1:18.97.  Schiellerup posted a season-best top-time with his leadoff split of 19.69. On the women’s side, Lauren Poli, Lotta Nevalainen, Ashlyn Koletic and Riki Bonnema posted a second-place finish, tapping the wall in 1:31.05.

 

The Pack men had a strong performance in the 50 freestyle, as Schiellerup, Boffa and Bilis each posted top-five finishes. Schiellerup paced the squad with a second place finish, tapping the wall in 19.74. His finish in the event meets the required time for an NCAA ‘B’ cut. Boffa finished third in the field with a time of 20.21, while Bilis finished fifth with a time of 20.34.

 

The women’s squad was also very successful in the 50 free, as Poli and Bonnema each finished in the top five. Poli tapped the wall second overall with a time of 22.90, while Bonnema recorded a time of 22.99. Both student-athletes were able to record a ‘B’ cut in the event.

 

The men’s squad closed the evening with a first place performance in the 400 medley relay and an NCAA ‘B’ cut. Schiellerup teamed with Bishop, Barrett Miesfeld and Boffa to capture the relay title with a time of 3:11.47.

 

In diving, Maddie Keeley collected a score of 239.20 in the ‘A’ final in the women’s one meter competition, while Grant Saale posted a score of 292.60 in the ‘A’ final of the men’s three meter competition.

The East Carolina women's swimming and diving team earned its highest finish ever the Janis Hape Dowd Nike Cup, which concluded Saturday at Koury Natatorium on the campus of the University of North Carolina. The Pirates completed the three-day meet with 1,504 points to finish runner-up to the host Tar Heels, which tallied 2,908.5 points.

The ladies, who were No. 38th in the latest Endless Pool rankings, finished 24 points ahead of 24th-ranked NC State and 48.5 points in front of No. 37 Duke. The ECU men's team placed fifth out of six teams with 1,167 points as UNC claimed the top spot on the men's side as well.

On the final day of competition, the ladies recorded eight top eight finishes to overtake the Blue Devils, who began the day 32 points in front of them, and finish in second-place.

Megan Sellers posted her second NCAA `B' qualifying time of the meet, with a mark of 2:15.46 in the 200-yard breaststroke to earn a fourth-place finish. She also recorded an NCAA `B' time in the 100-yard breaststroke during the event Friday night.

In the women's 200-yard butterfly, Bailie Monahan and Danielle Morrin placed fourth and fifth, respectively, with Monahan posting a NCAA `B' qualifying time of 1:59.48.

Alexandra Jones, Lauren Chew and Megan Rossi finished fifth, sixth and seventh, respectively, in the finals of 1650-yard freestyle, while Anna Gibas recorded a seventh-place finish in the 200-yard backstroke. 

 

On the men's side, Rokas Cepulis won the 200-yard breaststroke with a NCAA `B' qualifying time of 1:57.66, missing the meet record by 0.06. He too had previously made his NCAA `B' cut in the 100-yard breaststroke earlier in the meet.

Michael Dugan, Nikola Simic, Shawn Hunter and Trevor Irish set a new ECU varsity record in the 400-yard freestyle relay with a time of 3:00.31, finishing in fourth-place.

The Pirates will return to dual meet action in 2014 when they face IUPUI in Jupiter, Fla. on Jan. 6.