The Seattle University swim team gathered last Saturday, April 25, at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in downtown Seattle to celebrate the many successes of the 2014-15 season at the team’s annual end-of-season banquet.
Over the course of the 2014-15 campaign, 13 school records were broken, including senior Bart Wanot (Federal Way, Wash.) in both the 100 backstroke and 200 backstroke on the men’s side. In addition, Wanot anchored the 200 medley relay at the WAC Championships, joining with Morgan Montemayor (Seattle, Wash.), Tanner Schelling (Boise, Idaho), and Jack Baldoni (Applegate, Calif.) in breaking that school record.
For the women, Madi Lydig (Spokane, Wash.) started her freshman year strong by breaking the school record in the 200 backstroke at the Husky Invitational in December, and then she capped it by breaking the 1000 freestyle record in the same pool at the USA Swimming/Speedo Champion Series Sectional Meet in March.
Bethany Gehrke (Lynnwood, Wash.) had set the 1000 freestyle school record just two weeks beforehand at the WAC Championships at the same time she broke the school record in the 1650 freestyle. Also at the conference championships, Blaise Wittenauer-Lee (Portland, Ore.) set the school record in the 200 individual medley, and was part of four relay school records, as the women broke the school records in all five relays during the four-day meet, including lowering the standard in the 800 freestyle relay by 15 seconds as they finished third at the WAC Championships, the best finish by a Seattle U relay at the conference meet.
The Redhawks entered at least one new mark in the top 10 times lists for all 38 swimming events during the season, including 46 new times within the top five in Seattle U swimming history (24.2%). The women collected 270.5 points during the WAC Championships, 116.5 points more than in the previous season, while the men finished with 191 points during the four-day meet, just two points off their 2014 total.
Head swim coach Craig Nisgor handed out the team awards, starting with the most improved award as voted on by the swimmers. Sam Donohue (Portland, Ore.) earned the honor on the men’s side after returning from a redshirt year that included a study-abroad session and moving into the top times lists in both the 100 backstroke (51.48) and the 200 backstroke (1:53.73). Kaitlyn Overstreet (Cottonwood Heights, Utah) was the women’s recipient after posting times good enough for the top times lists in the 100 butterfly (58.27) and 200 butterfly (2:08.55), cutting four seconds off her 100 butterfly time and over 10 seconds off her 200 butterfly mark from last season.
The most valuable swimmer awards, also voted on by the student-athletes, were given to Wanot and Wittenauer-Lee. As mentioned above, Wanot set three school records during the WAC Championships, finishing sixth in the 100 backstroke with Seattle U’s first-ever sub-50 swims in the event (49.86 in prelims, 49.89 in finals) and posting an NCAA “B”-cut time in the 200 backstroke preliminaries at 1:46.01 before finishing eighth in the evening session.
Wittenauer-Lee also earned an NCAA “B”-cut time in the 200 breaststroke, first swimming 2:15.56 in the preliminaries before earning her second individual medal of the meet with a third place finish in the final in 2:15.72. Her first individual medal came in the 100 breaststroke, where she finished second in 1:02.63, plus she finished fifth in the WAC in the 200 individual medley with a school-record time of 2:04.08.
Nisgor and assistant coaches Katherine Kubancik and Zach Foster voted on the coaches awards, given to Nick Connors (Richland, Wash.) and Kristin Hoffman (Mercer Island, Wash.). Connors moved into second place on the Seattle U top 10 times lists in both the 200 freestyle (1:38.76) and the 500 freestyle (4:30.90) during the WAC Championships. Hoffman finished fourth in the 200 freestyle at the conference meet in 1:50.52, just 2/100ths of a second off the school record, plus she finished eighth in the 100 freestyle and was part of four relay school records during the meet.
In 2015-16, Jane Liggett (Portland, Ore.) and Allie McGavock (Glen Ellyn, Ill.) will return as captains of the women’s team for the second consecutive year, while Connors and Donohue will lead the men’s team as captains for the first time. Seniors John Fulmer (Kent, Wash.), Gehrke, Kyle Moline (Mercer Island, Wash.), Melissa Randolf (Everett, Wash.), Caroline Van Maren (Bellevue, Wash.), and Wanot were recognized for their significant contributions to the Redhawk swim program.
With just three seniors leaving from each team, the 2015-16 editions of the Seattle U swim teams expect to bring experience to the pool as they continue the program’s progress.