TUCSON, Ariz. (January 4, 2024) – The Northern Arizona Swimming and Diving team will begin the 2024 section of the calendar by competing against Arizona and Southern Illinois in a double dual on Friday in Tucson.
The Lumberjacks ended the 2023 calendar schedule with two wins against New Mexico State on Dec. 15 and Dec. 16. Winning the relay-only event on Dec. 15 62-46 and the traditional 16 event meet on Dec. 16 186-114.
In the relay day with the Aggies, NAU took the first four of the six total relays between the two schools.
Following up on the performance from the relay day, the 'Jacks continued their WAC dominance in the traditional meet, earning first place in 10 of the 16 events.
Starting out the meet strong, Northern Arizona had first-place times in seven of the first eight swimming events. This included a win in the 200-yard medley relay, edging out the New Mexico State 'A' relay team by less than a second.
Francesca Criscione came from behind in the next event, the 1000-yard freestyle, finishing with a time of 10:35.20.
NAU's other first-place finishers included: Sophie Velitchkov in the 100-yard backstroke, Cydnie Perkins in the 100-yard breaststroke, Maddy Rey in the 200-yard butterfly, Elsa Musselman in the 100-yard freestyle and 200-yard individual medley, Caylah Jago in the 100-yard butterfly.
Continued success followed from the diving squad, with the top five scores in the 1-meter diving event all coming from the Lumberjacks.
Victoria Knapp's 309.75 was 0.15 points better than second-place Grace Wesche's 309.60. Mackenna Stocker, Maegan Jensen and Kendall Marquez rounded up the top five in the 1-meter.
It will be the third straight season in which NAU has traveled to Tucson for a double dual. Last season, Northern Arizona earned a win over another Pac-12 school in Washington State 178-116.
In the double dual from a year ago, Casey Craffey and Criscione went first and second in the 1000-yard freestyle, Gracie Munk took top flight in 100 and 200-yard backstroke and finally, Rey was the winner of the 500-yard freestyle.
Festivities from Tucson are set to get underway at 2 p.m. on Friday.
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