University of St. Thomas Athletics

Saturday, October 23
Green Bay, Wis.
1:00 p.m.

172
at
128

Green Bay

Swimming and Diving: University of St. Thomas vs. Augustana University (October 16, 2021).
Photo by: Ryan Coleman

Swim-Dive has another good day, this time at Green Bay

10/24/2021 12:28:00 AM | Men's Swimming & Diving, Women's Swimming & Diving

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Meet results

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Tommie Women's Swim-Dive won 10 of 16 events, including both relays and both diving events, and claimed a dual-meet victory Saturday at UW-Green Bay. St. Thomas won 172-28 in what was their first official competition against a D-I program.

Event winners for St. Thomas were: The Tommie men won three events: Alex Foti in the 500 and 1000 Free; and Will Goldman in the 100 Breaststroke. Men's runners-up were John Gahnz in the 200 Back; Michael Scripp in the 100 Fly; and Joe Rudd in the 200 Breaststroke.



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The Back Story

The Tommie Women used a strong second half to win their first Division I meet as they came out ahead of the UW-Green Bay (UWGB) 172-128 to start the season 2-0.

The Men's team ran into a very talented UWGB team and fell 193-95.

Kudos to:
• Our new friends at UWGB, who put on an amazing swim meet and performed extremely well, all while not having a head coach. The team is led by eight swimmers, jack-of-all-trades Diving coach Tom Stover, and a parent group that brought the energy and the passion to see this team succeed. Well done by all!
• First-year Michael Scripp's parents for hosting an amazing dinner at their home. While we usually like action shots of the swimmers in the pool, this photo shows a team that is what Coach Blanchard wants – the team is a family. Thank you to Steve and Cindy!
• The parents of UST swimmers, who filled up the pool so that it looked like a home meet. We found out today that Purple travels well! The theme of the meet against UWGB was that there were two distinct halves, not only in the meet itself, but also in several of the races. The Purple proved that they are definitely a second-half team. The meet started out with the Women's team winning the 200 Medley Relay by 2.5 seconds, and they never looked back.

That followed a great effort by the distance group in the 1000 Free. First-year Alex Foti was neck-and-neck with his UWGB counterpart, but found a second gear in the last 100 to pull away with a convincing win. Several races in the mid-distance and distance category showed that St. Thomas knows how to "back half" a race. Elizabeth Bonneville and Abby Larson went 1-2 in the 200 Free, showing great effort in the final 100 yards.

Coach Scott Blanchard said, "We definitely train the back half of our swims, and it showed up here today. We are concentrating on putting in the yards, and we're really figuring out how to swim these races."

Senior captain Anna Astrup showed this perfectly, winning the 200 Fly. She was behind for the first 150 yards before putting an amazing final 50 to pull away at the end.

In a sometimes-overlooked section of the swim meets, Women's Diving put on an impressive performance, with Allison An winning one-meter and Peyton Ekman coming in second. Then, in three-meter, Peyton and Allison went 1-2. It was a great start to the D-I season for the promising divers.

While swimming doesn't have halftime, Coach Blanchard called his team together to have a quick talk after the diving event: "I told the team that we were looking flat, and we can't afford to be flat if we want to come here and race the way we want to. Then, it was the captain's turn to say a few words."

Senior captain Carlo Mallari took over, got the team in a circle, and got the energy going. "Every turn. WE FIGHT. Every stroke. WE FIGHT. Every Dive. WE FIGHT." After that, as Coach said, "the team got a bit juiced."

Taylor Rau won the 200 Breaststroke after making the turn at 50 yards in sixth place out of seven.

Abby Larson won the 500 Free after being behind for the first 350 yards. Also in the 500, Alex Foti, who was tied with his opponent for the first 400 yards, decided to skip second gear and go right to third gear and won going away.

Anna Astrup and Ann Van Hout both back-halved their races to come in second and third in the 100 Fly. Carly Wolf won the 200 IM in an exciting, come-from-behind victory.

The Tommie Women finished the meet the way they started, winning the 400 Free Relay, leading from the first 15 yards, and never relinquishing the edge.

Senior Ann Van Hout, who hails from Northeast Wisconsin said, "Today, we really emphasized that we were here to swim for each other and not ourselves. While it was a special moment for me swimming in the Fox Valley again, I am happy that the team swam well today. To come away with a win was exciting."

Senior captain John Gahnz, who is from Green Bay said, "The team is focused on getting one percent better every day. We don't like to focus on the wins and losses as our only goals. We go into meets knowing that it is an opportunity to get us one step closer to swimming fast in February."

Other notable performances included:
Luke Ridler – 200 Free 
Sophie Curran – 100 Back
• AJ Carollo – 100 Back
Grace Urkiel – 100 Breaststroke
Will Goldman – 100 Breaststroke
Michael Scripp – 200 Fly
Sophia Becker – 50 Free
Julia Guptail – 50 Free
Megan West – 100 Free
John Gahnz – 200 Back
Joe Rudd – 200 Breaststroke

 

Players Mentioned

Diving
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Fly-Back
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Freestyle
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Freestyle/IM
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Backstroke/Freestyle/Butterfly
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Diving
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Freestyle
/ Men's Swimming & Diving
Back-Free
/ Men's Swimming & Diving
Breaststroke/Freestyle
/ Men's Swimming & Diving
Freestyle/Butterfly
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Freestyle
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Back-Fly
/ Men's Swimming & Diving
Breaststroke/IM
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Freestyle/IM
/ Men's Swimming & Diving
Breaststroke/Butterfly/IM
/ Men's Swimming & Diving
Butterfly/IM
/ Men's Swimming & Diving
Breaststroke/IM
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Back-Breast
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Freestyle/Backstroke
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
Backstroke/IM
/ Women's Swimming & Diving
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