Personal best and meet record swims from Cassy Panka in the women’s 500 freestyle and Cole Fuerste in the men’s 200 freestyle events anchored the St. Thomas swimming and diving teams as the men claimed first place and the women took second in the weekend-long Conference Invite in the Anderson Pool.
Coach Tom Hodgson said there were “too many” highlights to count as the St. Thomas men collected 972 points — a more than 100-point win over second-place Carleton (851.5) — and the women earned 1,050 points to put them behind first-place Gustavus (1,593).
“I knew we were going to swim really well, but I was very pleasantly surprised by the fact that we just consistently exceeded expectations,” Hodgson said. “We swam a lot closer to what we dreamed these kids would go than what we expected the kids to go.”
Friday’s 10-event session brought an early sense of success for the Tommies, some who had tapered for the last two weeks in preparation for the meet that Hodgson said plays a large role for the coaches as they decide who will make up their 18-swimmer rosters for the Feb. 13-15 MIAC Championship meet.
Panka’s 500 freestyle swim was one of Friday’s three first-place success stories. Her 5:15.79 swim was 4 seconds off her previous personal best and just under 4 seconds faster than second-place finisher and teammate Mackenzie Maki (5:19.63).
“While I was swimming it, I felt good in the water. I felt strong,” she said. “Honestly, I knew had swam a good time, but I had no idea when I hit the wall and I saw a 5:15 that I had been that fast. It was a great race.”
As an athlete who dove into her swimming career at 14-years-old, Panka attributed both her rapid-paced success in the sport and her strong swim Friday to motivation from past and current teammates.
“I couldn’t have done that without all (my teammates) swimming by my side each practice, always cheering me on even in the hard distance sets,” Panka said. “When I didn’t feel like I was able to do it, having my teammates push me along, that really helped.”
Other top finishes for the Tommies in Friday’s events included the 200 freestyle relay’s — made up of Claire Larson, Emily Punyko, Courtney Grunewald and Erin Hogan — first-place finish by less than 1 second over Carleton and Anna Jeska’s meet-record breaking 2:15.15 swim for first in the 200 individual medley.
The Tommie men ended Friday night more than 100 points shy of Carleton while the women trailed Gustavus by 74 points.
Saturday’s 32 events added diving to the mix as the 1-meter competition kicked off a 32-event day. Katherine Becker and Casey Nightingale grabbed first and second place for St. Thomas respectively, leading a team of five Tommie women divers, who all placed in the top 13 of a 19-diver field. Becker also won the 3-meter diving event, earning 240.05 points.
St. Thomas perennial power and men’s diving captain Nick Johnson edged out St. Olaf’s Scott Hodgson by 5.2 points in the 1-meter competition and later shattered a meet record with his 313.85 points in the 3-meter event, this time beating second-place Hodgson by 83.25 points.
In the pool, Fuerste’s 1:43.73 swim in the 200 freestyle headlined St. Thomas’ 11 first-place finishes Saturday. Fuerste hit the wall nearly 5 seconds ahead of his closest pursuers — a three-man cluster from St. Olaf and Carleton.
Fuerste said despite some strong finishes in select heats and nerves heading into his 200 free swim, confidence kicked in when he took a quick and commanding lead.
“Right when I got off, I started off pretty fast. By the first half of it, I felt really good still, and I wanted to keep the pace up and keep ahead,” Fuerste said. “I was about a body length ahead of people, so I wanted to stay there. So I just drove it in in the last 100 yards, and it’s all history from there.”
Both the men’s and women’s 200 medley relay teams took first, while freshmen Tom Larocca won the 1650 yard freestyle — a mile-long event — by about 15 seconds and Nick Cox won the 100 yard butterfly event in 51.39.
After the coaches finalize the men’s and women’s 18-swimmer rosters this week, Hodgson said he plans to have those teams recover while still keeping up a competitive workload to prepare for the MIAC Championship meet.
“We’re going to make sure we get some speed work in and make sure we get our sprinters fast. Our distance kids, we’ll keep their yardage up, but mostly we’re just going to rest. We’re just going to let the kids recover. They’ve been working really hard. Some kids are kind of broken down a little bit,” Hodgson said.
Fuerste agreed resting will be key for any swimmers heading into a deep conference competition.
“I think the times will come, and the coaches will do well picking who will go on next,” Fuerste said. “It’s going to be hard. There were a lot of fast swims, and I know the team will do well.”
Briggs LeSavage can be reached at lesa4364@stthomas.edu.
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