Angad Singh
Sports Editor
The College of Wooster Fighting Scots men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams both finished fifth in the North Coast Athletic Conference (NCAC) championships on Saturday. The confer- ence ended on a high for Madison Whitman ’21 and Molly Likins ’22, with the swimmers breaking the school record for the 200m breast- stroke — held before by Likins at a time of 2:21.27. Whitman came in first between the two, and thereby set the new record with 2:19.06 to place second in the event. Both her and Likins secured NCAA “B” cuts. Due to their spectacular performance they earned All-NCAC honors, with Whitman getting her first and Likins her fourth.
Overall, there were a lot of top performers on the women’s team, with Brooke Brown ’21 winning the “B” final in 1:01.70 to finish tenth overall in the women’s 100 IM. Kate Murphy ’21 came in ninth for the 200-backstroke with a time of 2:13.26 and Kay Wetmore ’23 made a ninth-place finish in the 200-meter butterfly. On their performance over the weekend, Murphy said that “Conference is always an exciting time to see how all of our hard work has paid off after training for so many months!” She continues, “We all had amazing swims — many got lifetime bests, All-Conference awards, and even a few new school records. I’m already looking forward to seeing what we can accomplish next season!”
In the long-distance events Nell Kacmarek ’20 gave Wooster an eighth-place finish in the 1650-me- ter freestyle, with the 400 meter free relay team of Avery Pearson ’20, Likins, Brown and Lexi Riley-DiPaolo ’21 finishing in sixth. Whitman, whose performance over the weekend gave the Scots an amazing finish in the championship stated, “The team has put a lot of hard work in to prepare for what we accomplished at the meet.” She continued, “It is very assuring to look up at the scoreboard at the end of the race to see that hard work and dedication put into action.”
The men’s accomplishments over the weekend was of great note, with Craig Klumpp ’21 placing ninth in the men’s 200-meter breaststroke, finishing with a time of 2:08.04, his second-best time in terms of the school record. Eli Samuelson ’20 came in ninth in the 200-meter back stroke followed by Graham Letkeman ’22 and Hunter Pierson ’20 in the tenth and the 11th positions, respectively. Trey Schopen ’20, who came in 11th in the 200-meter fly, teamed up with Letkeman and Wyatt Floss ’21 and Josh Gluck ’21 to earn a sixth place in the 400-meter free relay.
On their performance Gluck had tosay,“We had a lot of guys on the men’s team that really stepped up and scored points where we needed it. There were many people that were sick or had the flu, and we still came through with a lot of best times.” He continued, “For us to have placed fifth with everything that happened was huge.”
Summing up the weekend and speaking on her sensational per- formance, Likins had to say, “We really showed that we can rise up to challenges and face them head on, and I admire that about us.” She continues, “I would say earning my fourth NCAC All-Honors was really exciting and I’m happy to wear it with pride and show what Wooster Swim and Dive is really about. We are all about doing everything together as a team. We win as a team and we lose as a team.” Going off of what Gluck said teammate Schopen stated,“ we had some incredible swimming and diving performances from the whole team. I have to give major props to all 3 of our divers for doing incredibly well especially Eric who got 3rd and broke 400 points and Niko who got 6th all the while learning 2 new dives just days be- fore the competition.” He continued, “ I could go on giving shoutouts all day, but the main takeaway is the team did absolutely fantastic this weekend with alot of A final finishes and even a few NCAA cuts and I really couldn’t be prouder of everyone.”