FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (January 6, 2023) — In their final combined meet of the season in Flagstaff, NAU Swimming and Diving had a strong showing, tying Colorado State 150-150 and defeating North Texas 231-69, while honoring outgoing seniors Emily Luberto, Brooke Seiber, Iliana Moore and Haley Mayhew.
"It was a great, great competition," Head swimming coach Andy Johns said. "It was a great way to celebrate our seniors. The meet went back and forth."
Colorado State entered the day on a 20-dual meet winning streak dating back to 2021, so a tie was something coach Johns still felt content about
"I think our team showed a lot of toughness," Johns said. "A lot of the conversations across the way were 'you got to be tough,' because they were tough. They're a really good team. They're well coached, so yeah we feel good, as good as you can feel about a tie."
Mayhew headlined the seniors' success with her win in the 200-yard breaststroke as the only swimmer under two minutes and 20 seconds (2:19.98). She also led the Lumberjacks with a second-place finish in the 200-yard IM (2:08.35) and was followed by freshman Gracie Munk (2:12.76) and junior Delaney Phillips (2:12.89).
"I was really happy with our IM'ers," Johns said. "To go 2-3-4, we just needed one more finish, one more touch in that relay and we could have come away with a victory."
The Lumberjacks started with a win in the 200-yard medley relay (1:44.36). Mayhew, one of the seniors honored before the meet, as well as junior Sophie Velitchkov, junior Caylah Jago and freshman Elsa Musselman.
Velitchkov continued her winning ways with a first-place finish in the 100-yard breaststroke (56.48), defeating Colorado State's Lucy Matheson by .02 seconds (56.50).
Musselman also carried over the medley relay win into the 100-yard butterfly where she took first with a time of 55.62.
Close finishes were a theme throughout the meet, especially in the 500-yard freestyle where junior Maddy Rey (5:05.84) and sophomore Helena Robla-Alvarez (5:05.85) finished within one one-hundredth of a second of each other to lead the way in the event. Sophomore Casey Craffey finished right behind the two (5:09.16) to complete the NAU podium sweep.
NAU diving continued its dominance at home, owning the top of the standings in both the 1-meter and 3-meter diving events.
The Lumberjacks took the top five spots in the 3-meter dive with freshmen Grace and Margaret Wesche finishing first and third respectively with scores of 304.15 and 293.80. Junior Maegan Jensen slotted right in between the Wesche twins in second (300.60). Junior Reaney Preston (291.90) and senior Emily Luberto (288.25) finished fourth and fifth respectively.
Jensen followed up her second-place finish in the 3-meter with a win in the 1-meter (286.80). NAU had three point-scorers in the 1-meter as well, with freshman Mackenna Stocker claiming second (276.75) and Grace Wesche earning points in this event as well with a fourth-best score of 266.00.
"Certainly our divers going 1-2-3 and 1-2-4 was a huge, huge part of our success," Johns said.
NAU Swimming and Diving will return to competition quickly as it rings in the new year with another meet against a pair of PAC-12 teams, Arizona and Washington State, in Tucson on Friday, Jan. 13 starting at 2 p.m. MST.
Johns said the back-to-back meets will help the team get back into a rhythm after the holiday break.
"I think this next week will be good for us to kind of adjust a little bit back to normal and then go down to Tucson, go down in elevation. We got to work on some details."
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