Swimming and Diving Teams Have Good Showing in Opening Weekend

Oct. 29 - (PITTSBURGH, Pa.) - The Tartans Swimming and Diving team opened their season this weekend with two back to back meets against local universities. Friday night the Tartans traveled to Westminster to participate in the Westminster Relays where both the men’s and women’s teams came out victorious. The men broke five meet records and the women broke three meet records. There was an overall great effort from both teams for this meet and it helped guide them into Saturday afternoon’s meet against Division II Clarion University.

The men’s team defeated Clarion University. They showed off the great depth of the team filling almost every event with the maximum of four swimmers in each. There were some very impressive swims from the men’s team. Upperclassmen Dave Krzeminski (Grandville, Mich./Grandville) and Mike Bailey (New Kent, Va./New Kent) won the 100 butterfly and 200 freestyle, respectively.

The freshmen class was extremely strong in their first dual meet of the season. Freshmen Andrew Seo (Irvine, Calif./Northwood) won the 100 and 200 breaststroke, Andrew Weitz (Flourtown, Pa./Germantown Academy) won the 200 IM, and Reece Dukes (Houston, Texas/James E. Taylor) won the 200 Backstroke. Also, in the 200 backstroke event the top four places went to four freshmen Tartans, Dukes, John Johnson (Allentown, Pa./Allentown), Scott Moorby (Cape May, N.J./Lower Cape May Regional), and Jeff Dahlen (San Juan Capistrano, Calif./Capistrano). “Overall this first weekend was a great start for the men’s team,” comments head coach Davis Belowich.

The women’s team, while losing to Clarion University, had some very strong swims to kick off their first meet of the season as well. Juniors Lauren Connell (Hasbrouck Hts., N.J./Hasbrouck Hts.) and Anna Kochalko (Encinitas, Calif./Univ. of San Diego HS) won the 100 and 500 freestyle and senior Jenny Sieger (Newtown Square, Pa./Radnor) won the 50 freestyle. Divers Charlotte Jennings (Yardley, Pa./Notre Dame) and Alex DeFazio (Pittsburgh, Pa./North Allegheny) also had a great start to the season finishing second and third on the one-meter event and second and fourth on the three-meter event.

Next weekend the Tartans will host the Carnegie Mellon Invitational with Johns Hopkins and UAA opponents Case Western and Emory University.