A win and a loss.
Northwestern swimming and diving traveled to Minneapolis this past weekend to compete against Minnesota and Purdue in a tri-dual meet. While the Wildcat men and women defeated Purdue, with the women winning 200-153 and the men 192-161, both teams fell to Minnesota with scores of 242-112 and 232-120.5 for the women and men respectively.
This competition was Northwestern’s final meet of the regular season — next up will be the Big Ten Championships later this month.
On the women’s side, the Wildcats picked up wins in the 100-yard breaststroke, 100 butterfly and 200 freestyle relay. The 200 freestyle relay victory came down to the wire, with the Wildcats defeating Minnesota by 0.07 seconds. Lindsay Ervin, Nikki Venema, Audrey Yu and Amy Pan combined for a time of 1:29.48 to get NU’s sole relay win on the women’s side.
Maggie Papanicholas won the 100 breast by over a second with a time of 1:00.35, setting a personal best. She beat out her 1:00.76 personal best that she set last season at the Purdue Invite. Her teammate Sophie Martin also set a best time en route to winning the 100 fly, going 52.34 and improving upon her previous mark of 52.53. She’s been progressively getting better in this even throughout her freshman season, and is now inching toward breaking the 52-second barrier.
Some other notable women’s performances came from Zoe Nordmann and Ervin. Ervin swept the second-place honors in the sprint events, clocking a season-best 22.37 in the 50 free and a 49.24 in the 100 free. Meanwhile, Nordmann went a time of 9:46.14 in the 1000 free to improve over three seconds from her previous best set in January.
Venema was also formidable for the ‘Cats this past weekend, going a season-best time of 1:45.59 in the 200 free to lead off Northwestern’s 800 free relay. She’s the first Wildcat to go under 1:46 in the event this season.
On the men’s side, the Wildcats picked up a few wins as well. Cade Duncan and David Gerchik were the stars of the show, while the 400-free relay ensured that the team wouldn’t walk away without a single men’s relay win.
Gerchik swept the backstroke races, setting a best time in the 100 back (46.07) and also winning the 200 back (1:41.82) by a body length. In the former event, he defeated his teammate Stuart Seymour by just 0.01 of a second. Seymour, Northwestern’s best 100 backstroke this season, was just a few tenths off his own best time.
Meanwhile, Duncan won the 50 free (19.97) and 100 free (43.03). However, he bettered his 100 free time by leading off the 400 free relay in a 42.90, which he, Seymour, Connor Schuster and Gerchik combined for a 2:52.21 to win. Duncan also posted a formidable 19.19 split on the 200 free relay.
The Wildcats put up some other notable performances that didn’t involve wins. One of them was from Tyler Lu, who finished third in the 200 breast and set a personal best time (1:56.45). Ever since taking up the event more frequently this season, he’s been drastically improving, besting his old mark of 1:56.91. Also setting personal bests was Schuster, who went 47.40 to place fourth in the 100 fly and 48.06 to place fifth in the 100 back.
Diego Nosack also put up some times worth noting, finishing second in both the 200 fly (1:43.35) and 400 individual medley (3:48.25). In the latter event, he was just 0.03 seconds short of finishing first.
Northwestern will next race in the Big Ten Championships, with the women going to Columbus from Feb. 19 to 22 while the men return to Minneapolis for their meet from Feb. 26 to Mar. 1.