Emma Svensson’s 21.98 50 Free Highlights FGCU Women’s Surge at CCSA Champs

Women’s Session

The distance swimmers of FGCU started of night 2 of CCSAs trying to replicate the dominance that their sprinting counterparts had laid down the night before.  Junior Lani Cabrera won the 500 freestyle in a 4:51.50. This four second drop from prelims was enough for her to jump from fourth to first and finish ahead of teammate Nina Schiffer (4:52:41). FGCU, though, wasn’t able to overtake Liberty’s depth in this event. Liberty saw swimmers finish in the  4th, 5th, 7th, and 15th place positions, and this was enough to outscore FGCU 86 to 82 in this event.

In the next event for the women the crowd was treated to a meet record by freshman Alona Kyselova from Incarnate Word. Her 2:00.28 was .01 seconds under the meet record set by Emilie Kaufman last year.  Things were still fairly close at the turn to freestyle, but Kyselova’s 28.08 finish helped her to take home her first conference title. Seven of the swimmers in this A final are underclassmen, so look for this race to be one to watch in the coming years.

There must be something in the water at the Gabrielson Natatorium because the last individual race of the night results in another meet record. Emma Svensson from FGCU blasted to a 21.98 to set the meet record and finish only .08 off the A cut. This time will almost guarantee her an invite to NCAAs, which would then lock up Florida Gulf Coast’s 200 medley relay’s bid after a Qualification Standard on Wednesday.  Liberty had four sprinters in the A final of this race, and this depth throughout night two helped them to jump up to the second position in the team standings.

To finish things off for night two, FGCU dipped under the meet record in the 200 free relay.  The team of Emma Svennson (22.17),  Kristin Julien (22.62), Becky Derogatis (22.93), and Kira Toussaint (22.06) finished  in a 1:29.78 and barely missed the A cut of 1:29.48. This helped to cap off an incredibly night by FGCU and pushed their lead to 165 points in the team standings.

Men’s Session

Incarnate Word junior Connor Hennessy got off to a fast start in the 500 freestyle, but he didn’t have enough in the end to hold off charging freshman Jonas Gutzat from UMBC. Both swimmers touched under the meet record. This was a twelve second drop from this season from Gutzat as he swam a very smart and controlled race throughout.

Continuing with the freshman trend, the 200 IM saw a win from UMBC swimmer Niko Trajkovic (1:46.66). Gardner-Webb could have jumped into first in the team scores after this deep event for them, but they suffered an unfortunate DQ in the A final. UMBC continued their reign on top of the podium with a win in the 50 freestyle by Greg Spoerlein.

UMBC divers came up big for their team by finishes 1st, 3rd, 4th, and 8th. Ryan Green had a strong showing on the boards to help UMBC regain their lead after Gardner-Webb had jumped ahead by 3 points when the 50 freestyle had concluded.  Nathan Lile was able to lead off Gardner-Webb’s relay with a 19.93 to help them claim the victory, but it wasn’t enough to retake the lead from UMBC. Diving hurt Gardner- Webb today as they slipped to third behind Incarnate Word.

Team Scores

Women

1. FGCU- 626
2. Liberty University- 461
3. University of Incarnate Word- 407
4. Georgia Southern University- 383
5. Gardner-Web University- 340
6. Campbell University- 191

Men

1. UMBC- 303
2. University of Incarnate Word -263
3. Gardner-Webb University- 241
4. New Jersey Institute of Tech- 132
5. Virginia Military Institute- 109
6. Howard University- 58