FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Arkansas women’s swimming and diving fell to the Texas A&M Aggies 170-120, Saturday morning in the Arkansas Natatorium.
“We need to get better and we will be a much better team in the future,” said head coach Sean Schimmel. “We need to take what happened today and build on it. We had some good things happen today, but we didn’t have enough of them.”
The Razorbacks (0-2, 0-2 SEC) clocked 13 second-place finishes against the Aggies (1-0, 1-0 SEC). Junior Anna Mayfield led the team with three, placing second in the 100-yard backstroke (55.10), 200 backstroke (1:58.76) and 200-yard IM (2:06.13). Senior Nikki Daniels registered a time of 1:02.10 in the 100 breaststroke, good for second.
Freshman Taylor Weiss claimed second in the 200 butterfly (2:03.46), while junior Nina Drolc was the runner-up in the 50 (23.46) and 100 (50.95) freestyle. Senior Julia Banach took second in 200-yard breaststroke (2:17.76) and sophomore Aiden Lister grabbed second in the 500 freestyle (5:00.74).
In the 100 freestyle the Razorbacks went two-three-four-five, led by Drolc (second place, 50.95), Maddie Monroe (third place, 51.99), Megan Strickland (fourth place, 53.69) and Anya Quedens (fifth place, 53.97).
In diving, freshman Nicole Gillis shined, placing second in the one-meter (285.30) and three-meter dive (310.28). Both her dives surpassed the NCAA zone diving standards. Senior Meghan Clark took third in the one-meter and hit the zone standard in the three-meter boards with a score of 261.68 and 292.05, respectively. Junior Hannah Bortnick claimed fourth in her three-meter (285.90) and one-meter (259.88) dives. Bortnick’s three-meter dive achieved the NCAA zone diving standard.
To close the day, the Razorbacks’ 200-yard freestyle relay took second with a time of 1:39.42.
Arkansas will next look to bounce-back against neighboring SEC-rival Missouri on Friday, Oct. 24 at 2 p.m.
“Moving forward, we look to build on what happened today and fuel the fire to become a better team to represent the Razorback nation in the way these women have trained for,” said Schimmel. “We’ve got to come in Monday morning fueled and ready to go. We need to get some great work in this week. We’ll look to do that and show up on deck on Friday and let them shine and be the team they’re capable of.”
For more information on Arkansas swimming and diving, follow @RazorbackSD.