Oct. 31, 2014
COLUMBIA, S.C. – The South Carolina women’s swimming and diving team improves to 3-1 on the season after defeating FGCU 166-131.
After finishing second and third in the 200 medley relay to open the meet, the Gamecocks won the next four events with wins from senior Victoria Mitchell (1000 freestyle), freshman Meredith Vay (200 freestyle), freshman Heather Merritt (100 backstroke) and junior Ellen Johnson (100 breaststroke).
The Gamecocks swept the 200 breaststroke with freshman Kersten Dirrane, Johnson, and freshman Brittany Oxley placing first through third, respectively. Freshman Sarah Smith followed with a win in the 500 freestyle.
Merrit recorded her second win of the meet in the 100 butterfly while Mitchell picked up her second win in the 400 IM.
The Gamecocks swept the diving events with freshman Julia Vincent claiming first place on both the one-meter and the three-meter. Senior Patricia Kranz and junior Lauren Lamendola placed second and third on both boards, respectively, while freshman Marissa Roth finished fifth on the one-meter and fourth on the three-meter.
Key Stat
The Gamecocks won 10 of 16 events
Notables
- Vincent posted new career best scores of 377.85 on the three-meter and 326.55 on the one-meter
- Smith recorded a new career best time of 10:07.14 in the 1000 freestyle
- Merritt’s wins in the 100 backstroke and 100 butterfly were the first of her career
- Vay recorded a new career best times of 1:50.06 in the 200 freestyle and 51.08 in the 100 freestyle, her times currently rank first on the team this season
- Merritt posted a new career best times of 56.83 in the 100 backstroke and 56.75 in the 100 butterfly, her times currently rank first on the team this season
- Johnson’s time of 1:03.34 in the 100 breaststroke is a season best
- Vay missed tying her career best time of 23.63 in the 50 freestyle by .01 seconds
- Smith posted a career best time of 4:56.22 in the 500 freestyle and recorded her second consecutive win in the event
- Taylor Worrell recorded a career best time of 4:58.39 in the 500 freestyle
- Kersten Dirrane notched her first college win in the 200 breaststroke
Quotable
Head swimming Coach McGee Moody
“Tonight was the first night we got to race at home. As a program, we’re always better at home than we are on the road and tonight was no different. I think we stepped up in a lot of areas. We had some great, great races from our freshmen. The upper class showed some great leadership. We were pretty much as good as we could have been in just about every event tonight. Florida Gulf Coast is an outstanding women’s program, so I’m proud of our ladies for stepping up and getting it done.”
Head diving coach Todd Sherritt
“I’m overwhelmingly happy with our performance today. We’ve been working on some very specific things and the everyone on the team did almost 100 percent of their objectives. We’re way further along right now than I anticipated. We’re seeing some high numbers. Julia (Vincent) obviously did a great job, 377.85 is a high score. Patty (Patricia Kranz) did really well and Lauren (Lamendola) did some phenomenal dives. My freshman (Marissa Roth), I’m really impressed with her. This was a very good meet for them. They were competing against each other and I really liked that. Overall today was almost a perfect day.”
Up Next
The Gamecocks host East Carolina and College of Charleston on Saturday, Nov. 8 beginning at noon at Carolina Natatorium.
