The men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams started the year off strong with two wins against Evansville at the Simon Rec Center on Saturday, Jan. 16. This was their first home meet this season, and they protected the house well, winning 25 of the 28 swimming events.
SLU’s men’s team won 205-76. Senior Shane Cano was victorious in four of his events. He took the gold in the 200-yard medley relay as the leadoff leg, finishing with a time of 24.41. Cano won two single events, the 50-yard backstroke (24.66) and the 100-yard backstroke (52.63). His final event was the 200-yard freestyle relay as the third leg, which his team won with a time of 1:24.85.
Senior Jack Kane also performed well for the men. He placed first in the 200-yard medley relay, along with Cano, as the second leg with a time of 26.11, and was the anchor leg in the 200-yard freestyle relay, anchoring with a time of 21.72. He won two individual events: the 50-yard breastroke (27.09) and the 100-yard breaststroke (1:00.02).
Sophomore Ryan McCoy ran away with three individual event titles: the 100-yard butterfly (50.20), the 100-yard freestyle (46.27) and the 50-yard butterfly (23.42). He locked in another win with Cano and Kane as the second leg in the 200-yard freestyle relay with a time of 21.31.
Freshman Isaiah Williams was off to the races at his first home meet as a Billiken, with a first-place finish in three events. He dominated in short and long distance races: the 1000-yard freestyle (10:10.30) and the 200-yard IM (1:59.18). He also placed fourth in the 100-yard backstroke with a time of 55.80.
The Billiken women held up their end as well, finishing the meet with a 182-92 victory. Junior Olivia Garrett won two single events and two team events. She was the third leg in the 200-yard medley relay (1:50.01) with an individual time of 25.97. She also started things off for the 200-yard freestyle relay team (1:39.85) with an individual time of 25.29. Garrett put away the 50-yard freestyle (25.09) and the 50-yard butterfly (26.71) with ease.
Sophomore Mina Glenesk joined Garrett in the relay victories. She was the anchor leg of both the 200-yard medley relay and the 200-yard freestyle relay, finishing with times of 24.38 and 24.61, respectively. She was successful in two longer-distance individual events as well: the 200-yard freestyle (1:57.27) and the 500-yard freestyle (5:10.31).
SLU finished in the top two spots in nearly every event.
They have a quick turnaround to their next home meet, which is against Truman State on Jan. 22 at 5:00 p.m. Both teams travel to Fishers, Indiana for the Butler Invitational two days later at 11:00 a.m. to continue their already successful season.
“I’m pumped for what I think this team will be able to do at conference,” said Kane. “We lost a lot of talent with last year’s senior class, but I believe we have what it takes to step up and be even better than we were in the past.”
