Rutgers Hits The Road For Two Meets In Illinois

Press Release courtesy of Rutgers Athletics

Rutgers swimming and diving will meet Big Ten competition for the first time this season during a two-meet weekend in Illinois on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 27-28. The Scarlet Knights visit University of Illinois for a Big Ten tri-meet with Northwestern on Friday before driving north past the Windy City for a quad-meet at Northwestern with Illinois-Chicago and Chicago.

“We are looking forward to a lot of fast swims and some fantastic diving this weekend,” said head coach Petra Martin. “Northwestern and Illinois always perform well at this time of year. We will need to make sure that we handle our travel well this weekend and have the best races of the season to this point. Saturday will be about grit as we will be racing NU again and have a few different schools in the mix that we normally don’t see. Our team is looking to step up and fight hard with back-to-back days of racing.”

KNIGHT NOTES

• Sophomore Alexandra Fabugais-Inaba racked up a meet-high 30 points throughout the season opening dual meet at Florida Gulf Coast, with victories in the 200-, 500- and 1,650-yard freestyle events, along with her participation in two second place relay swims.
• Junior Vera Koprivova grabbed her first event win of the season on Day 2 at FGCU, touching in first in the 200-yard backstroke. Koprivova placed second in the 100 Back on the first day of competition.
• Rutgers’ relay teams took shape during the first meet, with the top medley contingent made up of Koprivova (back), senior Larissa Neilan (breast), sophomore Federica Greco (fly) and sophomoreClare Lawlor (free). RU’s freestyle “A” relays were comprised of Fabugais-Inaba, Lawlor, senior Carli Rymer and sophomore Meghan Moses.
• The Scarlet Knights got a head start on training for the Big Ten Championships in the mile, as Fabugais-Inaba and freshman Lily Black are the only two swimmers in the conference this season to turn in times in the 1,650-yard freestyle. Fabugais-Inaba won the event at FGCU in 17:33.98.
• Junior Francesca Stoppa is off to a quick start in the butterfly events. The school record holder’s first 200-yard time of the season (2:01.48) is ranked eighth in the Big Ten, while her first 100-yard time (56.05) comes in 15^th this week.
• Greco’s 4:28.61 in the 400-yard individual medley is the 11^th fastest in the conference thus far, and was good for a second place finish by just one-tenth of a second at FGCU.

  OFF THE BOARDS
  The Rutgers diving team will see its first action of the season at this weekend’s meets, which will feature a highly contested matchup between two of the Big Ten’s top divers. Rutgers’ senior Addison Walkowiak and Northwestern’s junior Olivia Rosendahl will face off after dueling in the 1-meter A-Final at the 2017 Big Ten Championships in February. Rosendahl, the reigning Co-Big Ten Diver of the Week, finished second in front of Walkowiak’s sixth place performance, while Walkowiak was sixth in the 3-meter compared to Rosendahl’s 10^th place finish.

  Rosendahl is the reigning NCAA champion in platform diving.

  SCOUTING THE OPPOSITION

• Illinois is 1-1 in dual meets early this season with a win over Indiana State (188-111) and a loss at Michigan State (162-136). Senior Samantha Stratford and freshman Michelle McCord each won a trio of events in the Michigan State dual. Stratford dominated the freestyle events (100, 200 and 500), while McCord claimed the 100-yard breaststroke, the 200 backstroke and the 200-yard individual medley.
• Northwestern is 0-2 in duals, coming off a close loss against Georgia Tech (153-147) in which they held a lead until the very last event, and a 167-125 setback to No. 4 Georgia. Leading the way against Georgia with event wins were freshman Sophie Angus (100 breast), Mary Warren (50 free), Anna Keane (100 free), Calypso Sheridan (200 breast) and Olivia Rosendahl (1-meter diving).
• Illinois-Chicago, swimming out of the Horizon League, is 3-0 in dual meets this season with wins over Indiana State, Green Bay and Valparaiso. They have the reigning Horizon League Swimmer of the Week in senior Brie Hines, who won the 500 and 1,000 free, 400 IM and 400 free relay in a pair of dual meet wins over Green Bay and Valparaiso on Saturday.
• Chicago is ranked No. 9 in NCAA Division III and open its 2017-18 campaign at Northwestern. Highlighting the top returners on the women’s side are two-time All-American diver Agnes Lo and junior Hannah Eastman, a member of the fourth-place 800-yard freestyle relay team that shattered the previous program record in last year’s NCAA Championships.

  LAST TIME OUT
  Rutgers began its season with a dual meet loss at Florida Gulf Coast on Oct. 6-7, despite five event wins during the two-day meet.  [Recaps: Day 1 | Day 2]

  UP NEXT
  The Scarlet Knights host their 2017-18 home opener on Friday and Saturday, Nov. 3-4 in a penta-meet Georgetown, Pittsburgh, Seton Hall and Villanova at the Rutgers Aquatics Center. Friday’ssession begins at 4 p.m. and Saturday is slated for a 10 a.m. start.

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