ASU Sweeps BYU in Thrilling Battle

Tempe, Arizona – The Mona Plummer Aquatic Center hosted its second meet in two days, as the Arizona State University (ASU) Sun Devils took on regional rival Brigham Young (BYU) on their home turf today.  As the final scores below reflect, two very different scenarios played out between the men’s and women’s meets.  The ASU women dominated the entire competition with first place wins in every event, both relay and individual.  The men’s battle, on the other hand, came right down to the last event, as ASU and BYU alternated individual event wins, capped off by a BYU points sweep of the last individual event leading up to the final 400y freestyle relay.

Final Scores:

ASU (w) 182.0, BYU (w) 111.0

ASU (m) 151.0, BYU (m) 148.0

Full Meet Results Available Here

Women’s Events

The Arizona State women earned their fourth straight overall team win and they did so in convincing fashion.  The Sun Devil women led the day off with a win in the 200y medley relay, as the combination of Ingibjorg Jonsdottir, Jorie Caneta, Marian Spadoni, and Melanie Busch clocked a 1:43.60 for first place.

This performance was followed up by Anna Olasz’s second straight meet win in the 1000 freestyle, touching the wall first today in a time of 10:07.76 – a time which beat the next best competitor by almost twenty-seven seconds!  This was after Olasz threw down a 10:05.03 in the meet against Utah yesterday.

An ASU sweep of the women’s 200y freestyle was up next, as Marina Spadoni (1:50.95), Kat Simonovic (1:52.23), and Cheyene Degraff (1:53.53) finished 1-2-3 to further rack up the points for the Sun Devils. Furthering the ASU siege was breaststroker Jorie Caneta, earning her third win in two days, as she topped the field in the 100y breaststroke in 1:03.60 after winning yesterday’s 100y and 200y distances.

ASU’s Melanie Busch also earned a pair of wins today in both the 100y backstroke (57.05), and the 200y IM (2:06.96), while teammate Lori Layne Kremer scored first place points in both butterfly distances.  The senior from Alberta touched in 2:05.53 in the 200y race and 57.64 in the 100y contest.

The ASU sprinter contingent also wreaked havoc, earning sweeps in both the 50y and 100y freestyles.  Ingibjorg Jonsdottir led the way in the splash and dash, clocking a swift 23.82, while Juanita Barreto steered the 1-3 finish in the 100y freestyle with her time of 51.65.

The BYU Couger women did make a dent with some nice 2-3 finishes along the way, however, such as Riley Buer and Hannah Hansen coming in second and third in the 200y breaststroke, clocking 2:24.80 and 2:25.39, respectively.  The 100y butterfly also saw two Cougars finish in second and third place, with Haley Bertoldo touching the wall in 57.79 for runner-up, followed by teammate Lillian Moore in 59.11 to round out the top 3.

But, by adding in the ASU wins in the 500y freestyle by Jamie Friderichs (5:00.34) and the 400y freestyle relay (ASU “A” in 3:29.28), that sealed the deal for the Sun Devils to swim away with the win against the BYU Cougars.

Men’s Events

Back and forth was the name of the game today, as the Sun Devil and Cougar men took turns collecting first place finishes through most of the events.  This started with a solid 200y medley relay win by the BYU “A” team of Jake Taylor (22.89), Michael King (25.29), Rainer Ng (22.04) and Rafa Alfaro (21.10), who combined to clock the winning time of 1:31.32 narrowly over the ASU “A” team.  Just .08 separated the two teams, as the Sun Devil foursome of Thomaz Martins (23.86), Thibaut Capitaine (25.28), Tadas Duskinas (21.17), and Joe Worrick (21.09) touched the wall in 1:31.40 for second place.

The opposite result occurred immediately in the next event, where Jan Kutnik, swimming in his first race ever for ASU, finished the 1000y freestyle in a time of 9:31.39.  In a race almost ten minutes long, Kutnik just out-touched BYU Cougar Luis Ventura by only .11, as Ventura’s time was 9:31.50 for second place.

The first place pendulum swung back to ASU for the men’s 200y freestyle, with 6’4” sophomore Barkley Perry racing to the wall in a time of 1:39.68 for the win.  Two BYU swimmers rounded out the top three, as Jake Taylor and Stephen Richards touched in 1:40.37 and 1:43.95, respectively.

BYU was back on top in the 100y backstroke, with Rainer Ng yielding the victory with a winning time of 49.20.  He was the only swimmer under the 50-point mark in the event today.

ASU’s Thibaut Capitaine went on a tear today, doubling up for wins in both the 100y and 200y breaststroke events.  Today he swam a 56.13 for the 100y win and raced to a 2:03.28 in the 200y version.  Having won these same events in yesterday’s dual with Utah, the junior Sun Devil increased his two-day win total to four.

Sun Devil teammate Patrick Park also did his share of double duty damage today, winning the 200y butterfly in 1:52.00, over a half second faster than the rest of the field.  Park would also win the 100y butterfly distance in 49.53 to add points to the ASU booty.  Not done yet, Park also had a solid showing in the men’s 100y freestyle, earning second place in a time of 46.17 behind Brazilian teammate Thomaz Martins, who finished in 46.17.

December’s Pac-12 Diver of the Month, David Hoffer, also heavily contributed to the ASU team, as he scored 339.60 in the men’s 3-meter, while teammate Hunger Atha finished third.  Both earned points that would come into play in the thrilling quest to win.

But, BYU had other point-producing plans by way of Jake Taylor’s first place time of 1:47.88 in the 200y backstroke, along with Luis Ventura’s winning time of 4:35.64 in the 500y freestyle.  The big BYU blow came in the final individual event, however, as the Cougars swept the 400y IM to earn sixteen points in the home stretch.  Hayden Palmer led the charge with his first place time of 4:01.63, followed by runner-up Luis Ventura in 4:04.08 and Stephen Richards in 4:04.40.

The excellent performance made it do or die for the ASU Sun Devils for the 400y freestyle relay if they wanted a chance to take the overall team win.  Ten points behind, the ASU men took the point defecit challenge head-on, closing the meet with a 1-2 finish in the event, with a 3:04.28 for the winning “A” team and 3:08.80 for the “B” team (BYU’s team was disqualifed for leaving the block early.  This result was enough to give ASU the edge over BYU by three points and to put the W in the Sun Devil column today.