BATON ROUGE — The LSU swimming and diving teams swept the University of Louisiana at Monroe and Delta State on Friday at the LSU Natatorium in Baton Rouge.
The LSU men defeated Delta State, 130.50-82.50, and ULM, 124-89, while the Lady Tigers beat Delta State, 65-37, and ULM, 61-41. LSU won 17 of 24 events in the meet, improving to 2-0 all-time against the Statesmen of Delta State in the first meeting between the two schools. LSU also moved to 21-1 all-time versus ULM on the mens side while the Lady Tigers improved to 16-1 in its history against the Lady Indians.
The Lady Tigers won all four freestyle events, including wins in both the 200- and 500-yard freestyle by freshman Hannah Martin of West Monroe, La. Martin won the 200 with a time of 1:54.88, a career personal-best time and finished the 500 in 5:09.08. Sophomore Margaret Beadle of Baton Rouge won the 100 free in a time of 53.29 and junior Cackey Miltenberger won the 50-yard freestyle with a time of 24.85. Junior Laura Jo Leininger won the 100-yard butterfly with a time of 56.35.
Megan Wolters, a Cleveland, Miss., native won the 200-yard individual medley with a time of 2:09.79. Sophomore Jessica Wantz won both the 1- and 3-meter diving competitions with a score of 271.70 in the 1-meter and scored an even 315.00 in the 3-meter, both times of which were “B” cut times for the 2003 NCAA Qualifying Standards. Wantz previously qualified for the NCAAs in the fall.
The LSU men also swept the freestyle portion of the meet with Jan Minartz winning the 100-yard freestyle with a time of 47.33. Minartz also won the 200 IM with a time of 1:54.44. Junior All-American Evan Martinec won the 100-yard butterfly with a time of 50.45. Martinec also combined with Martin Latz, Robbie Moon and Chris Stanczyk to win the 200-yard medley relay with a time of 1:32.58. Senior Kyle VanArsdall also won the 3-meter diving competition with mark of 287.90.
“This was a good meet for us after having such a long break and it was just nice to get back into action again,” said LSU head coach Jeff Cavana. “The meet with Kentucky is huge because it is a conference meet and it is a big rivalry as well. We would like to finish up strong here at home before heading to the SEC Championships in a few weeks,” Cavana said.
The men are now 5-4 on the season while the women are 8-4 overall. LSU returns to conference action on Saturday when they face the Kentucky Wildcats at noon at the LSU Natatorium in the final home meet of the season. LSU will honor 11 seniors in a ceremony beginning at approximately 11:30 a.m.
The men beat Kentucky last season by a count of, 136-105, beating the Wildcats for the first time since the 1998-99 season while the Lady Tigers beat them for the first time since the mid-90’s. The Kentucky men are 2-3 overall and 0-3 in the SEC while the women are 1-4 and also 0-3 in conference action. LSUs men are 0-3 in the SEC and the women are 1-3.