Eastern Illinois Press Release
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. – The Eastern Illinois men’s and women’s swimming units returned to action Friday night at Indiana State after a month and a half since their last meet. The EIU women squared off against Ball State and Indiana State, while the men went head-to-head against Ball State. The Panthers swam tough at Indiana State as the two teams combined to finish in the top three 12 times, including five first place finishes.
The EIU men started the meet off strong with a first place finish in the 200-Medley Relay. Brogan O’Doherty, Brandon Robbins, Patrick Wood, and Jennings Soccorso-McCoy touched the wall first at 1:36.27.
O’Doherty kept the momentum going for the EIU men as he posted the top time in the 100-Back at 52.05, and followed that with a third place finish in the 200-Back at 1:59.63.
Soccorso-McCoy earned a pair of top 3 finishes of his own as he placed second in the 100-Free with a time of 48.14, and third in the 50-Free at 22.14.
Matt Jacobs and Robbins posted an individual first place finish in their respective events. Jacobs earned his top finish in the 100-Breast with a final time of 57.47. Robbins followed suit with a first place finish in the 200-Breast at 2:10.71.
Steve Fishman saw his first action of the season after returning from an injury and posted a pair of top three finishes. He earned his first in the 200-Back where he placed second with a time of 1:57.65. He followed that up with a third place finish in the 200-Free, touching the wall at 1:47.50.
The EIU men ended the meet at Indiana State strong as both 200-Free Relay teams placed amongst the top three. Fishman, Soccorso-McCoy, Jacobs, and O’Doherty posted the top time in the event at 1:27.05. Tyler Parrish, Shamus Shields, Nick Harkins, and Bryan McPherson finished not far behind at 1:29.46 and placed third.
For the EIU women, Lauren Oostman placed third in the 100-Back (1:00.18) and the 200-Back (2:11.37).
The EIU men’s and women’s swimming teams will close out their 2016-17 regular season next Saturday (Jan. 28) with a rematch at Valparaiso.
Indiana State Press Release
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. -- Indiana State earned their third win of the 2016-2017 season over the Eastern Illinois Panthers tonight defeating EIU 170 to 88. However, the Sycamores came up short against Ball State falling to the Cardinals 194 to 97.
“We recognized today that we need to make sure we’re preparing for all three of our individual events at conference and making sure that we are sharpening up on relays. Tonight we swam a couple different events that most people don’t swim, so it was a good overall meet for us and we had great energy coming out of the gate again this week,” said head coach Matt Leach.
The Sycamores entered this meet coming off of their winter training and a big win over Butler on Jan. 14.
Indiana State continued the momentum and placed four new school records tonight including a lifetime best swim from Alex Malmborg in the 100 freestyle.
“It was a lot of fun to see Blanca in the second event not only take the 500 freestyle record, but also the 1000 freestyle record. As we went through the meet there were a lot of great individual swims including Alex Malmborg coming out of the first break in the 100 freestyle setting a lifetime best time and also a new ISU record.”
Indiana State battled some sickness and injury tonight, but did not let it slow them down. The Sycamores set their final record of the night in the final event. Malmborg, Jacquie Price, Kendall Hansen, and Emily Boomershine finished second in the 200 freestyle relay.
The Sycamores continue the weekend of competition traveling to Indianapolis, Ind. tomorrow to face off with IUPUI and Notre Dame at 2:00 p.m.
“Obviously this weekend is in preparation for conference. We have scheduled IUPUI and Notre Dame tomorrow to act as a practice for the conference meet. We are looking forward to swimming IUPUI and Notre Dame for the second time this season and are excited to see how it goes.”
