Blue Jays swimmers qualify for nationals

Two weeks ago, the men’s and women’s swim teams capped off their dominant regular seasons with a win against Mary Washington. The women’s team finished with a 6-2 record, and the men ended with a 7-1 record. This past weekend, the teams went to Virginia Tech for one last meet before conferences begin. Hopkins was up against some tough D1 competition, but they were able to stay up front with the rest of the competition the way they had done all season.

“Coach loves watching us go fast,” senior David Woodford, who qualified for nationals this weekend in the 100 back and fly, said. “I do believe he likes to schedule the toughest competition within the Virginia to New Jersey area. Going into Virginia Tech wasn’t much different than any other meet. They are swimmers just as we are, and they are going to be fast and we have to try our hardest to be faster. As it can be seen by the results, we were right there with the other teams so I feel we accomplished our goals and then some.”

Woodford got the team off to a great start on Saturday, qualifying for nationals in two events. He swam a 51.00 in the prelims of the 100 back, which was a career best and qualified him for nationals in the event. Later that day he won the 100 fly in 49.91 for his second career best and national qualifying time of the day, allowing him to achieve his meet goals.

“Personally, going into the Virginia Tech meet, my goals were to qualify for the 100 back and 100 fly,” Woodford said. “Those were the only events I swam, and I was able to do what I set out to do. What is also special about those swims is it only takes one good swim at a meet to inspire others to go fast, and I like to think I helped others go fast by leading by example.”

This proved to be the case as the next day four swimmers on the men’s team qualified for nationals, including three freshmen. Freshman Scott Sterrett led the team in the 200 breast finishing in second place, just ahead of his teammate, freshman Bryan Pon. Sterrett swam a season best and NCAA provisional time of 2:05.35.

After Sterrett qualified in the 200 breast, freshmen Patrick Flynn and Josh Hughes and sophomore Michael McGoldrick all followed with NCAA provisional times. Flynn took second in the 200 back in a time of 1:50.66 while McGoldrick and Hughes went three-four in the 1650 free with times of 15:58.10 and 16:02.45, respectively. Freshman Connor Johnson also turned in a strong performance winning the 200 IM by more than two seconds in 1:54.66.

The women’s team turned in many career best and NCAA qualifying times as well. On day one of the meet, freshman Ariana Waitkavicz posted provisional time in the 100 back finishing fourth in the A final in a career best of 57.80. Freshman Helena Arose and senior Katie Rownd had a solid day as well finishing two-three in the 400 IM with times of 4:47.80 and 4:50.02, which was a season best for Rownd. They followed this with the 100 breast where Arose placed seventh in a stacked A final with a time of 1:10.01. Rownd won the B final with another career best time of 1:11.65.

Day two got off to a great start with freshman Sarah Westley winning the B final of the 100 free in 54.67 and sophomore Megan Auzenbergs finishing third in 55.95. Arose and Rownd continued their success from day one, finishing fifth and eighth on the 200 breast with times of 2:27.49 and 2:35.06 respectively. Waitkavicz had another provisional time in her prelim of the 200 back, finishing in 2:05.18. She grabbed sixth in the finals and later placed fifth in the 200 IM in 2:15.93 after swimming a season best of 2:12.66 in the prelim.

The team has a lot to be pleased with this weekend and should have a strong momentum bringing them into the Bluegrass Mountain Conference Championships this week. Woodford said that the goal going into this week's meet is to continue to qualify more people for nationals but, more importantly, to continue to have fun.

“Going into conferences we want to keep the trend going of getting as many people to qualify for nationals as possible,” Woodford said. “For some other swimmers who went to Virginia Tech but did not go as fast as they would have liked, conferences is their last chance to make nationals. More than that though we want everyone to have fun. You can be the world's greatest athlete but if you don't like what you're doing then you won't do your best. This part of the season is a culmination of hard work, teamwork and doing what we love. This is where we race.”