Tuesday, January 19, 1999
Bruins muzzle Bulldogs, Cougars at weekend competition
MEET: Strenuous training enables team to defeat Fresno,
Washington State
By Steve Kim
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
The UCLA women’s swimming and diving team convincingly defeated
its guests from Fresno State and Washington State on Saturday,
173-81 and 166-97, respectively.
Fresh out of a grueling holiday training period, the Bruins got
to release some fatigue. Still tired and not having competed in
weeks, they weren’t expected to put out fast times but managed to
defeat their competitors hands down.
"We did some practice races a few days before the meet, so that
helped," UCLA head coach Cyndi Gallagher said. "The intensity
wasn’t high, but for most cases, I was happy with how they swam. We
just have to keep getting faster and faster for the weeks to
come."
A Bruin placed first in each of the 16 events, including diving
and relays. Junior Keiko Price added two more first individual
finishes to the season by winning the 50 and 200 yard freestyle.
Sophomore butterflyer Beth Goodwin showed she can duke it out on
the crawl by winning the 100 free.
Long distance titles were shared among Bruin freshmen. Geraldine
Schick finished first on the 1,000-yard freestyle followed by Erin
Thomas. Later, Thomas took the lead in the 500 free.
Breaststroke and backstroke events have consistently been strong
for UCLA. Freshman Lyndee Hovsepian won the 100-yard breaststroke
while Jen Noddle won the 200. Both the 100- and 200-yard backstroke
races were Nicole Beck’s. The freshman has been dominating the
backstroke, along with senior teammate Amanda Hall.
Hall, a co-captain, said the team is only going to swim
faster.
"Our bodies were broken down because of winter training but our
spirits were up," Hall said. "We took our hard training and put in
into some fast swimming. We focused on the end of the season and
how we needed to swim fast here so we can swim faster later."
The Bruins were able to rack up some major points with several
consecutive placements. Noddle, Emmanuelle Schick-Garcia and Julie
Massey came in on a close, 1-2-3 race in the 400 individual medley.
The 100 butterfly was dominated by Katie Younglove, Sam Schacher
and Schick-Garcia. Younglove again led the 200 fly followed by her
teammates Goodwin and Janet Worthington.
"I had a different race strategy on the 200 fly," the
double-winning freshman said. "I usually go out too fast early in
the race so today, I tried to take it out easier. I felt better
with that."
UCLA divers Anne Baghramian, Liz Ackerman and Delilah More swept
the 1-meter event against Fresno State. Washington State did not
enter any diver. Baghramian and More later placed first and second
on the 3-meter springboard.
With this weekend’s meet out of the way, the Bruins aim to cut
times in their final home meet against Rice, which will be held
3:30 p.m. Friday at the Men’s Gym Pool. Because Rice is a small,
rebuilding team, it is likely to end up in Fresno State and
Washington State’s position.
The Bruins finally got some racing done after weeks without
competing. From Rice on, Gallagher said, they need to seriously
start focusing on improving.
"They should be on their way to swimming faster," the head coach
said, "so I expect big things."
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