Courtesy of Mean Green Athletics.
As the 2016 fall swimming and diving season has officially started, the Mean Green faced a heavy task this weekend with two competitions in the span of less than 24 hours.
Friday afternoon, North Texas raced in the North Texas Relay against Houston, Arkansas Little Rock, SMU and Oklahoma Baptist in Lewisville at the LISD Westside Aquatic Center. Saturday morning, the Mean Green were back in the pool hosting their annual Green and White intersquad meet.
“It was good to get out there and race with a team and then collect ourselves and challenge ourselves to come out the next morning and compete, albeit just against us your own team,” said junior Isabelle Morris. “I thought (Friday) we did really well and have shown serious improvement.”
NORTH TEXAS RELAY
The Mean Green won three events in Friday’s relay and finished with a team score of 322, which placed them third. SMU claimed first place with a team score of 422, Houston finished second with 386 points, Little Rock placed fourth with 220 points and OBU took fifth with 48 points.
North Texas claimed an event title in the 400-yard freestyle relay and the 300-yard breaststroke relay. They ended the meet with seven top-3 finishes.
“Friday’s relay showed me and the rest of the team we’re going to have a great year,” said freshman swimmer Haley Timmons who competed in three relay races Friday. “We’re all really excited to see how far we can go this year. I don’t think any of us have put a limit on it.”
The Mean Green’s 300-yard breaststroke relay team of Claudia Kitching, Sarah Vaisse andKathleen Rousset took first place in the event with a time of 3:18.39. They defeated a Houston relay team by nearly two seconds.
In the 400-yard freestyle relay, Vaisse, Morris, Emma Beth Jensen and Jowita Sienczyk won by a hair for North Texas with a time of 3:32.73.
“We’ve come closer as a team,” Morris said. “ When you race as a team and push through to do your part you start to see the results come through and I think we saw that on Friday.”
Vaisse, Sienczyk and Morris were three of the top performers for the Mean Green Friday. Each of the trio competed in four different races and their respected relay team finished in the top three of all their races.
NORTH TEXAS GREEN AND WHITE MEET
The next morning North Texas found themselves back in the water this time in a more relaxed setting as the team competed in their annual Green And White Meet.
Starting at 9:30 am Saturday morning, the Mean Green held 16 events at the Pohl Recreation Center. The North Texas White team claimed the victory over the Green team by a score of 154-136.
Unlike on Friday, Mean Green divers saw action in the Green And White Meet. SeniorSamantha Scheck won the 1-meter and 3-meter diving competitions.
“It was good to get out there and compete,” Scheck said.“It doesn’t matter if it’s an intersquad, you have a lot more nerves in that first meet. So to go out there and do well will really calm me down and has given me more confidence moving on this season.”
Timmons won two events Saturday, claiming victories in the 100-yard (59.98) and 200-yard butterfly (2:11.53). No Mean Green swimmer claimed more than two individual event titles. Vaisse won the 100-yard breaststroke (1:04.79) and 200-yard IM (2:09.72). Morris won the 200-yard freestyle (1:54.55) and the 50-yard freestyle (24.66) “We have something special,” Timmons said. “We’re all really tired but this showed we can do it.”
The Mean Green will be back in the pool on Oct. 15 when they head to Little Rock, Arkansas.
Courtesy of Mean Green Athletics.
