Michigan
Big Ten Championships
Michigan Challenging Lions, Gophers for Big Ten Crown
2/17/2006 12:00:00 AM | Women's Swimming & Diving
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- The University of Michigan women's swimming and diving team increased its event title total to six by winning three more events at the Big Ten Championships on Friday (Feb. 17) at the Bill and Mae McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion. The Wolverines (370 points) trail last season's winner, Penn State (372), by just two points in the team standings. U-M's six wins through 14 events is four more than any other school thus far.
Junior Kaitlyn Brady (Wilmington, Del./Mount Pleasant) added to her championship win total, swimming the first leg of the first-place 400-yard medley relay and winning the 100-yard butterfly in record-breaking fashion. Fellow junior Lindsey Smith (Dexter, Mich./Dexter) won her first individual title of the championships with her top time in the 200-yard freestyle. Smith also anchored the 400-yard medley relay team to the win.
The Wolverines opened the meet winning their second relay of the championships, as the quartet of Brady, Justine Mueller (Monroe, Mich./Monroe), Payton Johnson (Champaign, Ill./Centennial) and Smith combined for an NCAA consideration time of 3:38.45, breaking a pool record. Brady swam a blistering time of 54.05 to begin the race in the backstroke, setting a personal best and surpassing a NCAA automatic qualifying mark. After Mueller and Johnson kept it close in the breaststroke and butterfly, respectively, for the second day in a row Smith closed the gap and surpassed Wisconsin in the final leg to anchor Michigan to the win and propel U-M into first in the standings.
Brady won her second individual and fourth overall title in two days as she improved upon her record-breaking time from the preliminaries in the 'A' final of the 100-yard butterfly. She dominated the field, finishing nearly two seconds ahead of the second-place winner with her automatic qualifying time of 52.60 that shattered her previous personal best (54.03) as well as the meet, conference, pool and Michigan school records. Johnson finished eighth, Wendy Shieh (Ann Arbor, Mich./Huron) won the consolation final (55.20), and Carolina Sierra (Medellin, Colombia/Colegio Palermo de San Jos) finished 14th to help U-M to 43 points in the event and a 26-point lead over Penn State, 325-299, with Minnesota 10 points back of PSU.
Smith kept the streak alive, leading Michigan to its sixth Big Ten championship of the meet with her automatic-qualifying and pool-record time of 1:47.05 in the 200-yard freestyle. Smith trailed heading into the final 50 yards of the race but turned in a blazing final split of 27.05 to win the event for the third year in a row.
Michigan headed into the final two events of the night up by five points, but Penn State used wins in both the 'A' and 'B' finals of the 100-yard backstroke to jump past U-M in the team standings. Sierra had the Wolverines' top time in the event, finishing sixth with a consideration time of 55.84 after swimming a personal best of 55.50 in the preliminaries.
After achieving the sixth-best score in the preliminaries of the three-meter springboard diving (301.30), Elyse Lee (Albion, Mich./Albion) scored seventh (288.45) in the finals to bring Michigan within two points of first-place Penn State.
Mueller surpassed an NCAA qualifying mark and set a season best with her fourth-place time of 4:15.34 in the 400-yard individual medley, the night's first individual final. Freshman Emily Brunemann (Crescent Springs, Ky./Notre Dame Academy) finished behind her in fifth, clocking in at 4:16.92 and narrowly missing a automatic-qualifying mark. Brunemann's time is a career best and bested her preliminary time by nearly five seconds. The two finishes kept Michigan in first after two events.
The Wolverines will have a chance to win the program's 15th Big Ten championship under head coach Jim Richardson tomorrow (Saturday, Feb. 18) in the final day of the Big Ten Championships. Preliminaries begin at 11 a.m. and finals will start at 7 p.m.
Team Standings (After Day 3)
1. Penn State 372 2. MICHIGAN 370 3. Minnesota 339 4. Indiana 304 5. Purdue 287 6. Wisconsin 244 7. Northwestern 190 8. Ohio State 189 9. Illinois 132 10. Iowa 131 11. Michigan State 85
Event Winners/U-M Finishes (Day 3)
(Preliminary time in parentheses if faster than finals time)
400-Yard Medley Relay 1. Michigan 3:38.45#% (Kaitlyn Brady, Justine Mueller, Payton Johnson, Lindsey Smith) 400-yard Individual Medley 1. Kaitlin O'Brien, Penn State 4:12.03*% 4. Justine Mueller, U-M 4:15.34* 5. Emily Brunemann, U-M 4:16.92# 20. Annie Stein, U-M 4:26.15 27. Michelle Uhlig, U-M 4:30.29 100-yard Butterfly 1. Kaitlyn Brady, U-M 52.60*@$!% 8. Payton Johnson, U-M 55.25# (54.93) 9. Wendy Shieh, U-M 55.20# 14. Carolina Sierra, U-M 55.76 200-yard Freestyle 1. Lindsey Smith, U-M 1:47.05*% 31. Abby Seskevics, U-M 1:52.30 32. Christine Nichols, U-M 1:52.35 39. Noelle Martin, U-M 1:53.53 71. Samantha Montroy, U-M 2:01.05 100-yard Breaststroke 1. Amalia Sarnecki, Wisconsin 1:02.63#% 13. Valeria Silva, U-M 1:05.29 (1:04.58) 14. Ashley McLaughlin, U-M 1:05.42 (1:04.84) 28. Elsa Larson, U-M 1:07.28 100-yard Backstroke 1. Sarah Haupt, Penn State 54.04* (53.55%) 6. Carolina Sierra, U-M 55.84# 8. Hannah Smith, U-M 57.17 20. Katie Smith, U-M 57.86 Three-Meter Diving 1. Chelsea Davis, Northwestern 388.10^ 7. Elyse Lee, U-M 288.45^ 15. Ellen Van Cleve, U-M 258.75 33. Melissa Karner, U-M 193.05 36. Aubriana Ard, U-M 175.50 * NCAA automatic qualifying time # NCAA consideration time @ Michigan school record $ Big Ten meet record ! Big Ten Conference record % Bill and Mae McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion record ^ NCAA zone diving qualifying mark
Previous Results: Day 1 | Day 2
Contact: Matt Baumer (734) 763-4423
Players Mentioned
