Swim & Dive Posts Four Event Wins at Illinois Tri-Meet

Friday, October 27

Urbana-Champaign, IL

4 p.m.

Rutgers University

158

140

Illinois

Swim & Dive Posts Four Event Wins at Illinois Tri-Meet

Oct 27 | Women's Swimming & Diving

Results

Stoppa sets ARC Pool record in winning the 200-yard butterfly

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (Oct. 27, 2017) – Rutgers swimming and diving won four events and bettered five season time standards at Friday's Big Ten tri-meet at Illinois with Northwestern.

The Scarlet Knights topped the host Illini 158-140, but fell to the Wildcats by a score of 186-114.

"We had stronger performances today than at this point last year, but we do have to take better care of some events and win more of the close races," said head coach Petra Martin. "We were excited to pull ahead of Illinois, but wanted to be closer to Northwestern. Overall, this is a good gauge on where we are right now and what we need to do better over the next few months."

Junior Francesca Stoppa and sophomore Federica Greco finished 1-2 in the 200-yard butterfly to claim big points for the Scarlet Knights ahead of eight other swimmers. Stoppa edged her teammate and Italian countrywoman by just over a second with a final time of 2:01.55, which set a new pool record at ARC Pool. In a friendly and tight competition, Greco got her revenge later in the evening by winning the 100-yard butterfly by three-tenths of a second over Stoppa. Greco's 55.86 set a new season standard in the event for RU.

Junior Vera Koprivova easily claimed the 200-yard backstroke for her second event win of the season. Her 2:01.50 was the fastest time of the season for RU in the event, and put a sizable distance from the second place finisher from NU in 2:05.37. Koprivova started her day with a second place finish in the 100-yard backstroke.

The Rutgers diving team saw its first action of the season with senior Addison Walkowiak winning 1-meter diving with an NCAA Zone 1 Championships qualifying score of 288.05. That edged the 280.30 points from Northwestern's Olivia Rosendahl, the reigning national platform diving champion. In a budding rivalry, Rosendahl bested Walkowiak on the 3-meter boards 328.80-311.60 as both qualified for the NCAA Zone 1 Championships with their first and second place scores.

Junior Rachel Byrne was third in both diving events with a 264.15 off the 1-meter and an NCAA Zone 1 Championships qualifying score of 288.65 in the 3-meter event. Freshman Lauren Boone made her collegiate diving debut with fifth place finishes in both events.

Rutgers lowered 2017-18 team time standards in the 400-yard medley relay, where Koprivova (back), senior Larissa Neilan (breast), Greco (fly) and sophomore Clare Lawlor (free) finished second by under a second against Northwestern's A squad to open the meet. Sophomore Alexandra Fabugais-Inaba also lowered the team's best 1,000-yard freestyle time of the season with a fourth-place time of 10:36.22, taking 3.6 seconds off her time from the season opener at Florida Gulf Coast.

The 200-yard freestyle team just missed an event win 0.27 seconds behind Northwestern, but the foursome of Lawlor, senior Karli Rymer, sophomore Sarah Davis and sophomore Meghan Moses turned in a season-best time of 1:36.60.

Lawlor scored a pair of close second place finishes in her individual events, touching in at 23.95 in the 50-yard freestyle and 51.86 in the 100. She missed winning both races by an average of a half-second.

The Scarlet Knights swim meet No. 2 of the weekend on Saturday morning at Northwestern in a quad-meet with Illinois-Chicago and Chicago beginning at 11 a.m.

"Tomorrow morning, we will have to bite down and fight," Martin said. "We will have lots of miles in our legs, but this is great preparation for February and the grueling schedule of a four-day championship meet."

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