The Wyoming Cowgirls opened their season on Thursday at home in a dual meet against Mountain West rivals the New Mexico Lobos.
The final score sat at 162-95, with Wyoming partially-exhibitioning the last half of the meet (though leaving winners in-tact).
In all, Wyoming swept the 14 events on the schedule (with no diving), which was their goal coming in according to head coach Tom Johnson.
“The goal tonight was to win every event and New Mexico gave us some great runs,” Johnson said of the performance. “We knew New Mexico had some great sprinters, but our girls really held their own.”
In those sprint events, junior Emily Ridout started her season with very good swims. She posted a 23.60 in the 50 free and a 52.93 in the 100 free, both of which were victories, and both of which were significantly faster (seven-tenths and eight-tenths, respectively) than she was to start her sophomore campaign last year. In both races she beat out New Mexico’s Fanni Pataki (24.23/43.17) for the victory.
Freshman Maria Harutjunjan from Estonia also had an impressive start to not just her season, but her college career, by sweeping the breaststroke events. That included a 1:04.61 in the 100 and a 2:19.96 in the 200. After just one meet, her 100 time has already left her nearing the program’s all-time top 10 in the event.
The race of the day came in the women’s 200 free relay, where a total of 6 out of the 8 splits recorded by A relays were under 24 seconds. Ridout got the Cowgirls out to a big lead early, splitting 23.77 to Pataki’s 24.45, but the Lobos clawed back on literally every leg thereafter.
That included a 23.82 anchor from standout freshman Morgan Ginnis coming home, but ultimately the early Wyoming lead was too much. They won by a margin of 1:35.80-1:35.90.
the Wyoming women are back in action at the Denver relays on October 11th, while New Mexico is doubling-down with a meet against Northern Colorado on Friday evening before joining New Mexico at the Denver relays.