Texas Women, Indiana Men Come Up Big On Day 1 Of Meet With Gators

Texas vs Florida vs Indiana

• Friday, October 19 – Saturday, October 20, 2018
• Lee & Joe Jamail Texas Swimming Center
• Austin, Texas
•  Short Course Yards (25y)
• Live Results
• Day 1 Results (PDF)

Day 1 of the annual Texas/Florida/Indiana tri-meet is in the books, and it was the Longhorn women and Hoosier men who steamrolled their way to decisive leads on the scoreboard. The meet is scored in dual meet format, with each team scored head-to-head with the other two.

Indiana leads Texas 114-72 and Florida 119-67 for the men, while the Texas women outscored Indiana 120-66 and the Gators 135-51. The Longhorn men lead Florida 98-88, and the Gator women are up 109-77 over the Hoosiers.

Women’s Meet

Texas 120, Indiana 66

Texas 135, Florida 51

Florida 109, Indiana 77

Texas won seven of the nine swimming events for the women, led by distance freestyler Joanna Evans who won both the 200 (1:47.07) and 1000 free (9:50.81). The 200 was a 1-2 finish with teammate Evie Pfeifer (1:48.96), with Gator freshman Mabel Zavaros (1:49.11) in 3rd, while she won the 1000 by three seconds over Florida’s Taylor Ault (9:53.81).

Pfeifer added a win in the 200 IM late in the session, clocking 1:59.10 to top Florida’s Kelly Fertel (1:59.52), and the Longhorns also had individual wins from Claire Adams, Remedy Rule and Julia Cook.

Adams topped fellow junior Emma Ball of Florida in the 100 back, 53.52 to 53.84, and Rule won the 200 fly decisively in 1:56.60 over teammate Lauren Case (1:59.14) and Zavaros (1:59.16). It was another 1-2 in the 50 free as freshmen Cook (22.72) and Grace Ariola (22.77) were the only two swimmers sub-23.

The Longhorns finished off the session with a massive win in the 200 free relay, as Ariola, Cook, Anelise Diener and Adams all split 22s for a final time of 1:30.73. Florida was 2nd in 1:33.34, with Texas’ ‘B’ squad taking 3rd with a notable 22.5 split from Rule. Indiana touched 2nd in 1:32.77 but was disqualified for a false start, with anchor Shelby Koontz (not the one who false started) splitting a quick 22.88 on their anchor.

Indiana had two wins, thanks in large part to senior Lilly King. King’s 58.66 breast leg was crucial on the session opening 400 medley relay, as it gave them the lead after facing an early deficit after the backstroke (Texas ‘A’ and ‘B’ had 52-high legs from Adams and Cook), and Christie Jensen (53.26) and Koontz (49.41) were able to hold off the Longhorns down the stretch for a final time of 3:36.59. Texas ‘A’ took 2nd in 3:36.84, with Rule (53.22) and Diener (49.33) producing quick splits on fly and free in addition to Adams’ backstroke, while their ‘B’ squad took 3rd with Florida back in 4th.

King also won the 100 breast in 59.46, with Longhorn senior Olivia Anderson over two seconds back for 2nd in 1:01.88 and King’s freshman teammate Noelle Peplowski 3rd in 1:02.02.

Despite no victories, Florida had plenty of top-3 finishes to lead them to a 22-point advantage over Indiana.

Men’s Meet

Indiana 114, Texas 72

Indiana 119, Florida 67

Texas 98, Florida 88

Similar to the Texas women, the Indiana men rolled on day 1 with wins in six of nine events.

They started the meet off with a big win in the 400 medley relay, with Gabriel Fantoni (47.49) and Ian Finnerty (53.07) producing the top splits on their respective strokes before Vini Lanza (46.97) and Bruno Blaskovic (43.85) closed the show for a final time of 3:11.38. Texas took 2nd in 3:12.00, with a notable breast leg from Charlie Scheinfeld (53.54) and a 43.03 anchor from Tate Jackson, with the Gators back in 3rd (3:14.19).

Khader Baqlah then threw down a 1:34.84 to win the 200 freestyle, using a 23.61 final 50 to pull away from Indiana’s Mohamed Samy (1:36.21). Baqlah’s time is the fastest in the nation so far this season, overtaking USC’s freshman Alexei Sancov‘s 1:35.82. Gator freshmen Kieran Smith (1:36.33) and Trey Freeman (1:37.70) were 3rd and 4th, while three-time defending NCAA champ Townley Haas was 5th in 1:37.85.

Fantoni, Finnerty, Lanza, Samy and Michael Brinegar then rattled off five consecutive Indiana victories to really assert their dominance. Fantoni (47.87) won the 100 back over Texas’ Ryan Harty (47.96), Finnerty won the 100 breast by close to two seconds in 53.49, Lanza took the 200 fly in 1:45.27 over Longhorn freshman Andrew Koustik (1:46.54), and Samy went 1-2 with Blaskovic in the 50 free with showings of 20.04 and 20.18.

Brinegar then produced the #2 time of the season in the 1000 free, clocking 9:00.14 while Freeman (9:07.48) made up over two seconds on the final 50 to take 2nd over Texas’ Chris Yeager (9:07.72).

The Longhorns had their two wins come in the final two events of the session, as John Shebat won the 200 IM in 1:45.63 over Florida’s Grant Sanders (1:46.51) and Smith (1:48.07), and then they closed the day out with a very close win in the 200 free relay in 1:20.23. They had sub-20 legs from Daniel Krueger, Jackson and Haas, while the Indiana ‘A’ and ‘B’ squads were close behind in 2nd and 3rd in 1:20.33 and 1:20.43 respectively. Samy split 19.56 on the ‘A’ team, while Lanza anchored the ‘B’ squad in 19.61.