2016 MWC DAY 4 (MOUNTAIN WEST CONFERENCE) WOMEN’S CHAMPIONSHIP
- Wednesday, February 17 – Saturday, February 20
- Texas A&M Natatorium, College Station, TX (Central Time Zone)
- Prelims 10AM / Finals 6PM (Wed-Sat)
- Defending Champion: San Diego State (results)
- Championship Central
- Live results
This meet has been a back and forth battle between Nevada and Boise State all weekend. Defending champion San Diego State could never recapture enough momentum to win again. While Nevada led after two days, the tide turned back to Boise State a day ago.
Once again, diving made a huge difference for Nevada and was perhaps the biggest factor in their first ever Mountain West Conference championship.
1650 Freestyle
Genevieve Miller had already set a conference record in the 500 freestyle. Today she backed that performance up with another record. The swim also puts her in contention for NCAA qualification.
In the conference battle, Boise State actually had four swimmers in the top 16 to build their advantage over Nevada.
Top three
- Genevieve Miller, Air Force 16:01.39
- Riley Spitser, San Jose St 16:22.79
- Sara Menke, Air Force 16:31.47
200 Backstroke
With Morgan McMormick’s eligibility finished, this meet was ripe for some new blood. Freshmen Ugne Mazutaityte seized the day, coming from behind to beat 100 bacsktroke champion Samantha Wicks.
While Boise State had two of the top three, Nevada was able to stem the bleeding with two finalists of their own.
Top three
- Ugne Mazutaityte, Fresno St 1:54.47
- Samantha Wicks, Boise St 1:54.76
- Allyson Kleinsorgen, Boise State 1:56.59
100 Freestyle
Michelle Troup of UNLV won an incredibly tight three way race of the title. Just .05 separated the top three at the 50, and the same margin held for the final result. Boise State once again scored two finalists.
Top three
- Michelle Troup, UNLV 49.12
- Whitney Weisz, San Diego St 49.14
- Emily Ridout, Wyoming 49.17
200 Breaststroke
Yawen Li was able to defend her conference title. Like the 400 IM, she was well short of her own league record in doing so. 100 breaststroke winner Maria Harutjunjan tried to stick with Li but couldn’t do so past the 100 mark.
Nevada turned the corner in the team race, with three out of the top five.
Top three
- Yawen Li, Nevada 2:10.58
- Maria Harutjunjan, Wyoming 2:12.18
- Arantxa Medina, Nevada 2:13.33
200 Butterfly
Picking up on their momentum from the breaststroke, Nevada scored two more medalists in this race. Sita Kusserow touched first, although she was well short of any conference or meet marks.
Top three
- Sita Kusserow, Nevada 1:59.59
- Molly Coonce, Wyoming 1:59.99
- Erin Fuss, Nevada 2:00.01
Platform Diving
Earlier in the weekend, freshmen Sharae Zeng had won two victories over teammate and 2015 Diver of the Meet Krysta Palmer. On platform, Palmer dominated. Her win was huge for Nevada in the team race, as the Wolfpack took 2nd, 5th and 10th in this event as well.
Top three
- Krysta Palmer, Nevada 362.15
- Zoe Lei, Nevada 278.00
- Keely Bishop, Wyoming 248.70
400 Freestyle Relay
Although Boise State came up short in the team race, they kept their heads up to finish the meet with a league record. Notably, both Brittany Aoyama and Emma Chard swam significantly faster than their individual swims.
Nevada swam a clean second place, clinching the win and their first ever conference title.
Top three
- Boise State 3:15.38
- Nevada 3:18.16
- UNLV 3:19.51
Awards and Final Scores
Fresno St’s Ugne Mazutaityte was named Freshmen of the Year. Boise State’s Jeremy Kipp, in his first year, won Swimming Coach of the Year. Nevada diving coach Jian Li was named Diving Coach of the Year. Samantha Wicks was named Swimmer of the Year.
Final Scores:
- 1. Nevada, University of 664
- Boise State University 651
- San Diego State University 511
- University of Wyoming (W) 457
- University of Nevada, Las Vega 373
- San Jose State University 258
- New Mexico, University of 248
- Colorado State University 223
- U S Air Force Academy (W) 207
- Fresno State University 182
Update: Harper brought in four athletes for spring semester (one swimmer and three divers). Hardly an example of poor taste of character. He confirmed that the new additions are in it for the long haul and were not recruited solely for this year’s MWC championship. Given that Jian Li You is one of the best diving coaches in the country, it makes sense that she have more than two divers to coach (Palmer and Dominik).
Every MW team has foreign swimmers and divers, and Nevada is no different. Who says they will only be there for one semester? Harper identified a need for more divers. I don’t recall the roster from last semester, but I’m pretty sure Krysta was the only one. She also wasn’t deprived of anything. Sure, she didn’t win the diving board finals, but she got second place, which contributed points, and won the platform and she’ll be going to NCAAs to compete.
I wouldn’t call it genius. I would call it someone who will do anything to win. Bringing in foreign divers for a semester to score a bunch of points for your conference meet and depriving swimmers or for that matter divers on your team from participating in a scoring position shows a poor taste of character. But Nevada did win the meet though! How many NCAA cuts did they achieve over the weekend?
MW Swim, don’t be such a sore loser. A lot of us BSU families were surprised to get caught and passed on the last 3 events of the last day, but it was clear to see that Nevada wasn’t going away after the 400 MR DQ. Of course we wanted our girls to win, but UNR brought enough swimmers and divers to score the points needed to win. They had enough scholarship available to bring in foreign athletes in January and there aren’t any American athletes available at mid-year. Today BSU had 12 swimmers and divers named to the All-MW Conference Team, same as San Diego State (last years champions) – Nevada to their credit had 16 named to the… Read more »
Brilliant Championships well done Team Nevada, incredible job by the Divers its true to say but this is a Swim and Dive competition – Great Job Neil Harper – Genius
Great job by Coach Harper in his 1st year at Nevada.
Congrats to Nevada and Boise State. It would be interesting to see how good Boise State could be with any kind of aquatic facility, in particular the divers. Hard to recruit divers with that pool.