Iowa swimming and diving boasts individual success at Shamrock Invitational
Both the Iowa men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams had a variety of noteworthy performances in South Bend.
Ryan Adams for The Daily Iowan
University of Iowa swimmers cheer as their teammates compete in the Men’s 200 Freestyle during a swim meet between Iowa and Minnesota at the CRWC on Oct. 26. Iowa’s Aleksey Tarasenko won the event with a time of 44.21.
January 26, 2020
The saying goes, “Rather be lucky than good.” The Hawkeye men’s swimming team was just plain good as they finished in second place over the weekend in South Bend, Indiana, at the Shamrock Invitational, tallying 917 total points.
The Irish men didn’t need luck either, defeating Iowa for the Invite’s top spot by a whopping 361 points.
Notre Dame also finished atop the standings in the women’s competition with 1114.5 points. The Hawkeyes swam to a fourth-place finish, totaling 629.5 points at the Rolfs Aquatics Center.
On day one of the two-day event, Iowa had several impressive finishes.
For the men, freshman Sergey Kuznetsov — who joined the team for the second semester — got an individual win in the 100-fly.
Iowa took second, third, and fourth in the 50-free as sophomore Aleksey Tarasenko finished in 20.16. He was followed closely by seniors Steve Fiolic (20.39) and Will Scott (20.48). Tarasenko touched just three-hundredths of a second behind Ohio State’s Semuede’ Andreis.
In the men’s 200-free relay, Fiolic, Tarasenko, Scott, and senior Joe Myhre nabbed a win as they came in at 1:20.10 — Iowa’s second fastest time of the season.
Freshman Mohamed Neuman added to Iowa’s first day score with a fifth-place finish in the 3-meter diving event.
Iowa’s men’s team had 586 points heading into day two.
Senior Hannah Burvill captured the women’s team’s first victory of their first day of competition in the 200-free, immediately after Kuznetsov had secured the first win for the men.
Freshmen Julia Koluch (54.63) and Kennedy Gilberston (54.88) finished second and third in the 100-back. Koluch’s time was fast enough to enter the top-10 in Hawkeye history.
Burvill, freshman Macy Rink, freshman Millie Sansome, and senior Allyssa Fluit took the 800-free relay title with a time of 7:12.79, fifth fastest in program history.
Related: Iowa swimming and diving heads on weekend trip to South Bend for Shamrock Invitational
The Hawkeye women finished with 442.5 first-day points.
Both squads continued their success on the second day of competition, and Sansome again found herself at the top of the leaderboard. But that’s not the only thing she achieved on Jan. 25.
In the 29th of 40 events at the Shamrock Invitational, Sansome broke her own school record in the 200-back in 1:55.94. She won the event over Bayley Stewart of Notre Dame by just over three-tenths of a second.
Her time of 1:55.94 bested her previous personal and school record of 1:56.31, which she set back on Dec. 7 in a preliminary race at the Minnesota Invitational.
Other Iowa victories on Saturday included sophomore Anze Fers Erzen in the men’s 200-back and Tarasenko in the 100-free in 43.95. Senior Michael Tenney captured Iowa’s final victory of the invite in the 200-fly in 1:46.56.
Fellow Big Ten conference member Ohio State finished second in the women’s competition with 975 points over the two days.
Next, both Hawkeye teams will welcome the Western Illinois Leathernecks to the Campus Recreation and Wellness Center on Feb. 7. This will be the season’s final dual meet before the Big Ten Championships begins Feb. 19.
