Feb. 18, 2015
Dear Nevada Swimming and Diving Fans,
Hello from the Mountain West Championship in San Antonio, Texas! The first day was short with just three events…but the competition is fierce. Steve's beard, which has been growing since the first week of November, is also fierce and currently died an unfortunate shade of teal. It turns out that blue dye on bleached blonde hair takes on a definite greenish sheen - not quite the navy blue that Steve was going for.
We started off the championship with a school record in the 200 Medley Relay. Freshman Jaeger Turner (Community Health Science) made her conference debut with a blazing 24.9 in the backstroke, followed by a solid 28.58 from Ary Medina (soph/Nutrition). Then Sita Kusserow (soph/Biochemistry) had the second fastest fly split in the meet with 23.75 and Teresa Baerens (soph/Engineering) finished it off with 22.33 in the free. The overall time was 1:39.57, which shaved more than a second off the previous record and was good for 5th place, compared to 7th place from last year.
In the second event, Krysta nailed one beautiful dive after another to win gold in the 1-meter. She did an incredible job managing the pressure: She came into the meet ranked first, finished prelims in first, and then stayed calm and consistent to take the victory by over 20 points. Krysta's win was a school record and, more awesomely (if that's an acceptable adverb) it's a Mountain West meet record!
The Wolf Pack ladies broke yet another record in the 800 Free Relay, the final event of the evening. Sita, right out of the 200 Medley relay, started us off strong with a 1:49.23. Freshman Josefin Eriksen (Journalism) then kicked like a maniac to split 1:47.19 and pull us into third place behind Boise State and San Diego State. Yawen Li (junior/Art) swam third and made up some ground, splitting 1:48.21. Then Teresa came off the blocks like a freight train splitting 49.37 on her first 100. She held her breath for an amazing finish, touching out San Diego State for second place. Her split, 1:45.07, was the fastest in the meet and our overall time, 7:09.70, improves the school record by two seconds.
Back in 2012, the record was 7:25; then in 2013, the team brought it down to 7:18; last year, they knocked it down to 7:11; and this year, they were knocking on the door to qualifying for NCAAs.
So after this first day, the team scores are quite bunched up and we're sitting in third place, a mere nine points ahead of Wyoming. Tomorrow morning the swimmers will race the 500 Free, 200 IM, and 50 free while the divers go after the 3-meter. Our goal is to get as many girls as possible into the top 16 (scoring places)…while blasting more school and personal records.
By the way, a HUGE thank you for the encouraging texts and emails. I read them to the girls, who love hearing from you. For all our families in the stands, YOU ROCK! We had strong Wolf Pack energy and your loud cheering gives us an extra boost.
Onward we go…
Battle Ready, Battle Born!
Abby Steketee, head coach
