Rice
Senior Casey Clark broke a school record for the second time in as many days, won two individual events, and swam on a winning Rice relay to help lead the Owl swimmers to the Hansel Invitational team title Sunday evening in Pearland, Texas.
Clark and the Owls were in firm control every step of the way through the weekend’s three-day, four-team, prelim/finals meet at the Pearland Natatorium. Rice finished with 1,254 points. Tulane was in second with 837.5 points, followed by North Texas (639.5) and the University of Houston (438).
Seemingly to prove that the school record she set in the 100-yard backstroke on Saturday was not a fluke, Clark went out and broke Mandy Mularz’ 12-year old Rice record in the 100-freestyle on Sunday. With the lead the entire race, but also with a steady challenge from Tulane’s Mia Schachter, Clark finally barreled into the wall with a time of 49.26 for another NCAA provisional cut. It was the fifth different school record of Clark’s collegiate career.
Four individual wins (to that point) and two school records is a busy weekend, but Clark wasn’t quite finished. The Spring, Texas, native came back just two events later and led a 1-2-3 Rice finish with Erin Flanigan and Kaitlin Benjamin in the 200-butterfly. Clark’s 1:58.46 was a little more than one second off her existing Rice record in that event, but she was practically on her own when teammates Flanigan and Benjamin finished at 2:02.37 and 2:03.06, respectively.
To both Flanigan’s and Benjamin’s credit, both had already swam the rugged 1,650-freestyle earlier in the meet. Flanigan in fact led a 1-2 Owl finish in the mile with Anniina Ala-Seppälä as the duo posted Conference USA’s best times in the event this season (16:33.25 and 16:56.93). Benjamin was tenth overall with a 17:47.78.
Rice veterans Rachel Moody (2:16.82) and Madison Livingston (2:19.63) scored big for the team in the 200-breaststroke with season-best times on the way second and third place finishes, respectively. Freshmen Julie Litver (2:01.79), Jaecey Parham (2:01.86) and Kiley Beall (2:02.01) were part of an Owl scoring barrage in the 200-backstroke where the Rice rookies placed third, fourth and fifth.
The Blue & Gray made one final statement in the meet’s last event, the 4x100-freestyle relay. Tulane blazed out to a two-second lead at the first exchange, but Clark put Rice back in front on the second leg and senior Marissa Konicke gave Rice a little more room on stage three. True freshman Hannah Deters, who earlier had an eye-opening 50.84 to win the 100-freestyle’s consolation final, held-off a final Green Wave charge on the anchor leg for a winning time of 3:23.04. The mark is the best Conference USA this season and completed an Owl sweep of all five relay races over the weekend.
Tulane
In the realm of college athletics, it’s one thing to achieve success but it’s another to strive for more. That was the attitude of the Tulane University swim team throughout the weekend as the Green Wave posted a second-place finish at the Pearland Invitational.
Of the 17 individual swims for the Green Wave on Sunday at the Pearland Invitational, six were lifetime bests and another 10 were season-best performance. No performance was more impressive, however, that of junior Mia Schachter. After falling one one-hundredth of a second from her career best performance during the 100 freestyle, where she finished second, the native of Arroyo Grande, Calif., one-upped herself in the final event of the three-day invite with a school-record 49.85 with a leadoff split in the 400 free relay.
“Hands down, this was the best meet I’ve coached and I couldn’t be more proud of the way our team performed each day,” Tulane head coach Katie Robinson said. “We had another strong day to finish out the three-day meet, with another school record to add to the books.
“One thing that truly impressed me as a coach was the ability of our women to manage their energy through the entire meet, day in and day out. I saw them gain energy from each other and become excited each time someone from our team swam fast. This is such a supportive team and they are learning how to be competitive with each other in a fun way to help each other succeed together. It is such a wonderful characteristic of our team.”
The Green Wave finished the event with 837.5 points, second only to the 1,254 amassed by Rice. North Texas was third with a score of 639.5, followed by host Houston at 438.
The 100 freestyle mark was the sixth school record set or tied by the Green Wave during the Pearland Invitational and the third of the weekend by Schachter, who equaled her own record in the 50 free with a 22.90 on Friday and the 100 breast with a 1:00.24 on Friday.
Schachter’s record-setting leadoff split surpassed the 100 free former mark of 50.01 by Linda McEachrane on Feb. 26, 2005, at the Conference USA Championship. The split also helped spearhead the Green Wave A team 400 relay unit of Schachter and the freshman trio of Kaitlin Simpson, Alex Lakota and Emma Simpson to a second-place showing at 3:23.93 – the second-fastest time in school history.
“Mia had two very good swims in her 100 free and came up 0.02 shy of the record and her milestone of breaking the 50-second mark,” Robinson said. “She came up to me after her individual event at night and said to put her as the leadoff on the relay because she was going to get the 49. It was a moment where you could see her ferocity and determination bright as day. I love moments like that. With her leading the way and three freshmen to follow, that relay was an extremely thrilling race to watch.”
Also posting career-best performances were junior Roni Meyer in the 1650 free, junior Holly Grender and freshman Tirol Palmer in the 200 back, and Lincoln, Lakota and Simpson in the 100 free.
Meyer led Tulane in the mile with a 17:14.22 – a time that ranks No. 5 in the Tulane record book individual and No. 9 overall – to finish fourth overall while junior Rachel Schneider (17:14.44) and sophomore Ali Talwar (17:29.44) both posted season-best marks in the event.
Grender, who set Tulane records in both the 200 and 400 IMs earlier in the weekend, finished second in the 200 back at 2:01.04. Her time ranks second in the Green Wave annals while Palmer clocked a 2:03.58 to finish seventh and post the No. 9 individual time in Tulane history.
Schachter led the Wave in the 100 free with a 50.03 to finish second among the Pearland field, followed on the team by a fourth-place showing by Lincoln (51.37), a 14th-place finish by Lakota (51.94) and a 15th-place performance by Simpson (52.42). Simpson’s 51.89 during the 100 free preliminaries ranks ninth in Tulane individual history while Lincoln and Lakota’s finals marks stand fifth and 10th, respectively.
Sophomore Joy Jason paced the squad in the 200 free with a 2:22.31 to finish sixth, and her 2:21.34 in the preliminaries ranks as the No. 6 individual time in the Green Wave record book. Fellow sophomore Ellie Sills, meanwhile, led Tulane in the 200 fly with a 2:04.65 to finish fifth and her prelim mark of 2:03.80 sits ninth individually on the all-time Tulane listing.
“We absolutely couldn’t do this without the leadership from our seniors,” Robinson added. “They were amazing team players, giving pump-up talks and creating the fun environment. We’ve always said happy swimmers are fast swimmers. These seniors lift our team up and I am so grateful for each of them.”
While the Pearland Invitational marks the end of the fall portion of the 2014-15 season, the Green Wave will enjoy a break before opening the spring slate on Saturday, Jan. 10, when they travel to Coral Gables, Fla., to take on Rutgers and host Miami. Tulane’s next home meet is slated for Jan. 24 when the Wave play host to North Texas in the Reily Center. Prior to the start of that contest, Tulane will honor the senior class of Morgan Evans, Molly Jubas, Vanessa Loewen, Amy Needham, Claire Schelske, and Laura Turpen with a special ceremony and admission is free.
COACH ROBINSON’S QUOTES FOLLOWING THE PEARLAND INVITATIONAL FINALE
Overall thoughts on Saturday’s performance
“Hands down, that was the best meet I’ve coached and I couldn’t be more proud of the way our team performed each day. We had another strong day to finish out the three-day meet, with another school record to add to the books. Mia Schachter had two very good swims in her 100 free and came up 0.02 shy of the record and her milestone of breaking the 50-second mark. She came up to me after her individual event at night and said to put her as the leadoff on the relay because she was going to get the 49. It was a moment where you could see her ferocity and determination bright as day. I love moments like that. With her leading the way and three freshmen to follow, that relay was an extremely thrilling race to watch. We couldn’t have ended the meet with a better team effort, not just from the A relay but from the B and C relays too.”
On the leadership of her seniors
“One thing that truly impressed me as a coach was the ability of our women to manage their energy through the entire meet, day in and day out. I saw them gain energy from each other and become excited each time someone from our team swam fast. This is such a supportive team and they are learning how to be competitive with each other in a fun way to help each other succeed together. It is such a wonderful characteristic of our team. We absolutely couldn’t do this without the leadership from our seniors. They were amazing team players, giving pump-up talks and creating the fun environment. We’ve always said happy swimmers are fast swimmers. These seniors lift our team up and I am so grateful for each of them.”
On the 200 backstroke
“We had a duet of backstrokers drop significant time in the 200 backstroke tonight in finals. I was holding back tears of joy after [Elizabeth] Cook and [Holly] Grender’s swims. Liz Cook swam her lifetime best, which was a long time coming. I couldn’t be more proud of her efforts and focus on fine tuning all the details and race strategy we’ve been working on. It feels very good to see her accomplish that time and her smile afterwards said it all. I can’t say enough good things about Holly Grender. She has had the meet of her life here in Houston. She dropped multiple seconds again to go a time she said she never even thought possible. Unstoppable is the best word I have to describe her.
On the 100 freestyle
“The 100 free was another strong event for us and one we’ve worked hard to develop amongst our freshmen. They have a good model to follow in Mia with her incredible focus and self-awareness. Emma Lincoln had a lifetime best in this event and she will continue to fine tune the details of this sprint event. [Alex] Lakota and [Kaitlin] Simpson had great swims as well and, with a few corrections in stroke technique, they will be even better in the coming months. Coach [Sarah] Woodbury has done an extraordinary job in helping me coach this team, specifically with the sprinters. Her energy, intensity, humor and charisma is truly inspiring not only to this team, but to myself as a coach as well. I absolutely couldn’t do this without her and am so grateful to have her alongside of me leading this team.”
On the 1650 freestyle
“The mile is always on the last day of these multiple-day events. The mile is already a grueling event and to do it after racing hard for two days leading up to it is not easy. Our milers had set goals for this meet and they achieved them together. They were all in the same heat and I saw how they helped each other race the 17-minute long event. Ali Talwar had the best meet since I’ve coached her and Rachel [Schneider] fought back strong after not being all that happy with her earlier events. Roni [Meyer] lead the way on our team with her finish and was just a few seconds off her best time, swimming it in a way that was very smart. It’s good to see their conditioning and race strategies coming to play in their races.”
On the 200 breaststroke
“Our trio of seniors in the 200 breast did well and achieved the goal times they wanted for this meet. Laura Turpen had the best meet I’ve seen her have and dropped time yet again in this event. It was fun to see them race together in the B final and help each other swim well. Joy [Jason] had a solid swim in the A final and we will continue to work with her technique to drop her time down later this season.”
On the 200 butterfly
“The 200 fly was much better at night for [Alex] Brindisi and [Amy] Needham. Ellie Sills’ goggles filled up with water right off the start and yet she still fought her way through a pretty good time without being able to see. I was glad to see her have the composure and maturity in such adversity.”
