Swimming sweeps Invitational

This weekend at the Patriot Invitational swimming and diving meet, the men's and women's swim teams captured the championships titles. Competing against eleven other teams, including host George Mason, University of Maryland?Baltimore County, Georgetown, Seton Hall, University of North Carolina-Wilmington, and American, among others, the swim teams had a particularly stellar showing in their last meet before the Christmas break.

"The team in general swam really well at the invitational this past weekend," Jackie Rodriguez said. "I was not expecting that Duke would win the meet by that much but it goes to show how much more depth we have this year. This meet really showed us how much the team has improved."

For the women, Rodriguez won both the 500 freestyle and 100 breaststroke events. In the 500 free, she broke the meet record, swimming 4:54.49 in only the prelimilary round, before winning the title in the finals with a 4:55. Also fairing well was Amy Halligan, who set a meet record in the 400 IM with a time of 4:24.46. She, along with three other Blue Devils, placed in the top five of the 200 IM as well.  Lauren Hancock broke her career-best time in the 200 butterfly and took first place with a time of 2:01.18.  In the 400 freestyle relay, the Duke women also finished as Nora Stupp, Alison Sundberg, Halligan and Julia Lewis teamed up to record a time of 3:30.86. The women won the meet by a margin of 228 points ahead of the host team, George Mason.

John Humphrey helped lead the team to victory, taking first place in both the 400 IM and 100 butterfly.  Jay Ashenfelter, Teddy Helfers and Andy Storm all placed in the top six for the Blue Devils in the 400 IM, along with Humphrey. 

"The major improvement from my point of view has been the added depth from our freshman class," Humphrey said. "Almost everyone scored points this weekend, making it a great team effort." Although some of the teams in the Patriot Invitational do not boast a strong swimming program, the meet was a great way to prepare for the future.

"This meet really helped the team prepare for ACC's by giving us a chance to swim in a full three day meet," Humphrey said. "To have this experience now will give us more confidence in February to compete." The men certainly used this meet a great preparation for the future, amassing 827 points in the three-day event. Other standout swimmers included freshmen Kevin Arthofer, who won the 100 breaststroke, and Jordan Duran, who placed third in the 100 backstroke event. Billy Pierce, who placed second in the 100 backstroke, took first in the 200 backstroke, swimming a career-best time of 1:50.62. Further, four of the men reached the finals in the 200 breaststroke, including first-place finisher Arthhofer (2:04.28), Storm (2nd, 2.04.90), Ben Rowland (5th, 2.08.85) and Kevin Ko (6th, 2:09.86).

With solid performances all around, the team is ready for the winter season to begin. They will travel to Ft. Lauderdale, Fl. over the winter break and return to swim against NC State in their first home meet of the winter on January 17.