Swimming On the Road at Georgia Saturday
Team's first competition since a home dual vs. the Bulldogs on Oct. 23
COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina swimming and diving returns to the pool on Saturday morning as it squares off on the road with nationally ranked Georgia for a dual meet. It will be the first action for both swim squads since facing the Bulldogs back on Oct. 23 at Carolina Natatorium.
“It’ll be good to get back and race again,” said head coach McGee Moody. “This year has been tough obviously for every sport, completely different. And you know, what we thought was going to be our schedule this year, back in August, got reworked and we made a decision that we wanted to minimize our exposure to other teams as much as possible. It’ll be good to get a chance to race again see where we are and see how our athletes are responding to our training over break. Georgia is one of the best teams in the country. They have a tradition that is second to none.”
Diving begins at 9 a.m. ET from Gabrielsen Natatorium. The women’s portion of the meet begins at 10 a.m., with the men following at 2 p.m. Live scoring and results for the competition will be provided through MeetMobile. A live stream will also be available for all three portions of the meet through SEC Network+.
In the last meeting, Georgia was victorious winning 165.5-129.5 on the women’s side and 182-97 on the men’s side.
Junior Mari Kraus led the Carolina women with two event wins in the 100 back and 200 back. The Oswego, Ill., native, swam times of 55.59 and 1:59.98, respectively. Freshman Sammi Ai won the 200 IM in her Gamecock debut. The Pasadena, Md., native finished with a time of 2:01.99, narrowly missing out on the top-10 all-time at Carolina in the race.
Senior Yu Qian Goh was dominant with wins in the 1M and 3M dives. She matched a career-best score in the 1M with a 308.25. Goh tallied a score of 325.55 in her 3M victory. Her performance earned her SEC Female Diver of the Week honors for the first time in her career.
Junior Lewis Burras, the school-record holder in the 50 free, headlined things individually for the men. He notched his first win of the season in the same event with a time of 20.06. Senior AJ Ross took third with a time of 20.66.
The 400 free relay team of Burras, Ross, Mark Shperkin and Phil Costin posted an impressive, season-opening time of 2:58.04 en route to victory. It narrowly missed cracking the 10th best time in school history which previously was set in 2013 (2:57.17).
This week, the Bulldog women come into the meet ranked third with the men ranked No. 2 in the country via the latest rankings from the CSCAA.
Both squads will be following strict guidelines with adherence to the SEC Medical Guidance Task Force Requirements for COVID-19 Management.
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