LONG BEACH – The UC Santa Barbara swim teams continued to break records and win titles on Friday at the Big West Conference Swimming and Diving Championships being held at Bellmont Plaza. Junior Naomi Javanifard led the group picking up two individual titles and a relay crown on the third day of the four day meet.
In the first event of the evening, Jessica Schwalb took second in the 400 individual medley with a personal best time of 4:22.09. Teammate Kelsey Lewis finished third in 4:23.08 and Brittany Borowitz placed fifth in 4:23.60. Laurel Ferguson swam in the consolation final and took 10th with a mark of 4:28.13.
In the men’s 400 IM, Chris Good took third with a time of 3:52.09, which is NCAA Championships “B” qualifying standard and personal best time by over three seconds. Freshmen Ryan Garcia (3:56.75) and Mitchell Long (3:58.82) took sixth and seventh, respectively in the final. Evan Simoni won the consolation final with a time of 3:57.27.
In the women’s 100 butterfly, Naomi Javanifard won her first career individual Big West title with a time of 54.37. Katie Ure took second in 54.46 and Erin Yamamoto took third in 54.67.
Danny McClary was the Gauchos’ top-finisher in the 100 fly, taking second with a career best time of 47.69. Jon Kraetsch took sixth in 48.62 and Chris Wiggin placed seventh, touching the wall in 48.70.
The following event was the women’s 200 free and UCSB took second through fourth place in the event’s final. Courtney Bauer fell short of repeating as the conference champion in the event, taking second in a time of 1:49.98. Lindsay Gaudinier placed third with a time of 1:50.70 and Nadia Dwidar was fourth, touching the wall in 1:51.03.
On the men’s end, Joe Wood captured his first individual Big West title in the 200 free with a time of 1:36.87, which meets the NCAA “B” qualifying standard. Scott Vogelgesang took second with a mark of 1:37.13. Joe Plume took eighth in the finals, touching the wall in 1:40.03. Dan Morris (1:38.69) won the consolation final and Kevin Kuhn took 12th (1:40.22), also earning points for UCSB.
In the women’s 100 breast, Katy Freeman broke the UCSB, Big West and meet records, but came in second to UC Davis’ Heidi Kucera by .10 seconds. Freeman finished in 1:00.48 and Nicponski finished third in 1:00.97. Anne Marie May took fifth with a time of 1:03.99. Carri Cook picked up additional points for UCSB in the consolation finals as she finished 12th overall with a time of 1:06.03.
Jeff Sudbury got his share of the men’s 100 breast title, tying with UC Irvine’s Chris Rosales in a time of 54.76. Travis Jepson finished third, touching the wall in 55.59.
Next up was the women’s 100 backstroke where Javanifard picked up her second Big West title of the evening after touching the wall in 54.53, a NCAA “B” qualifying standard. Sasza Lohrey took 10th in a time of 58.58 and Kendall Neely took 11th in 58.72 to round out the Gaucho scorers in the event.
Freshman Kevin Ferguson, who was seeded fourth heading into the 100 back final, won the first Big West individual title of his young career after touching the wall in 48.61 seconds. Bradley Matsumoto placed third in a time of 49.21.
In the final event of the evening, the Gaucho women’s “A” 200 free relay successfully defended their title while also breaking their own school, conference and meet record. The team consisting of Javanifard, Dwidar, Bauer and May posted a time of 1:30.52, breaking their previous record of 1:30.71, set at the Husky Invitational this past December.
The men followed suit, with the team of Kuhn, Vogelgesang, Matsumoto and Sudbury taking the 200 free relay title in a meet record time of 1:18.40. The Gauchos set a school record in the same event during a time trial on Wednesday – the first day of the meet – with a mark of 1:17.99.
After three days of action, the Gaucho women lead the pack with 623 team points. They are 118 points ahead of UC Davis, which is in second place. The UCSB men currently lead with 565.5 points, 11.5 points ahead of UC Davis, which has diving.
