PORTLAND, Ore.—Lewis & Clark College women's swimming won three events and added seven second-place finishes on Friday night, in their Northwest Conference dual opener against Linfield College.
THE BASICS
Linfield 113, Lewis & Clark 78
HOW IT HAPPENED
Sophomore
Dahlia Linkow and junior
Elise Barton both posted individual wins and the Pioneers women's team opened their first NWC conference meet with a win in the 200 Yard Medley Relay against the Wildcats.
Linkow earned her first collegiate victory in the 100 Breaststroke. She beat six competitors to the wall when she used a frantic comeback over the final 25 yards to earn first place. The sophomore closed in 1:16.09 to edge out Linfield's Alana Zumbrum by 0.13 seconds (1:16.22). Fellow sophomore
Angie Cummings (1:17.04) and junior
Ella Gimon (1:25.67) finished fourth and fifth in the race.
Barton won the 50 Yard Free for the second-consecutive meet. The junior beat out a field of seven swimmers with a final time of 25.55. Gimon came in third overall with a mark of 28.49. Sophomore
Ainsley Rios placed seventh with a final time of 30.51.
Lewis & Clark opened the meet with a big win in the 200 Medley Relay. The Pioneers quartet of Cummings, Linkow, junior
Aniqah Gaffoor and senior
Ella Stephan beat out two Linfield teams to win the event. Lewis & Clark relay team finished the race in 1:58.22.
Cummings nearly added a fourth win for Lewis & Clark. In a photo finish in the 100 backstroke, Linfield's Sarah Arpag beat Cummings to the wall by .01 seconds. Arpag touched in 1:04.23 and Cummings registered a mark of 1:04.24. Gaffoor finished third in the race with a final time of 1:11.27.
Barton added a second-place showing in the 100 Free. In a field of five swimmers, Barton narrowly finished second with a final time of 57.10 (0.43 seconds out of first). Stephan came in fourth place with a time of 1:01.14. Rios closed in 1:09.40 to finish fifth.
First year
Claire Hurty posted a pair of second-place showings. She was one of four swimmers in the 500 Free and faced off against reigning NWC Swimmer of the Meet Kirsti Keppo for the first time at the collegiate level. Hurty swam with Keppo for the first 200 yard and posted a huge collegiate PR with a time of 5:46.21. Sophomore
Sophie Justus came in third in the race (6:10.38) and senior
Josephine Mann placed fourth (8:02.32).
Hurty added a second-place result in the 200 Free. She finished second out of seven swimmers with a time of 2:08.25. Linkow touched the wall in 2:16.65 to finish fifth overall. Stephan came in sixth with a time of 2:19.31.
Gaffoor placed second out of five swimmers in the 100 Fly. The junior touched the wall in 1:01.93. Mann closed in 1:19.95 to finish in fifth place.
Justus earned a second-place showing in the 1,650 Free. She faced off against Keppo in the Mile and finished the race in 21:20.53.
Junior
AJ Schroeder added a second-place result in the 400 IM. Schroeder recorded a time of 5:22.42 to finish second.
In the final event of the night, Lewis & Clark placed third out of four teams in the 200 Free Relay. The quartet of Barton, Hurty, Justus and Gimon touched the wall in 1:49.26. They were just 0.06 seconds behind Linfield's B Team.
BY THE NUMBERS
- Barton has now won the 50 Free in both meets this year and has posted three first-place finishes (100 Free vs La Verne).
- Hurty improved her time in the 500 Free vs La Verne by 36 seconds on Friday night. She also shaved off nearly three seconds from her time in the 200 Free.
- Gafoor (2+ seconds in the 100 Fly) and Cummings (1.11 seconds in the 100 Backstroke) each improved their times in an event by over a second from the La Verne Meet.
WHO'S NEXT
Lewis & Clark will welcome Pacific University to the Zehntbauer Swimming Pavilion on Friday night at 6 p.m.
