BATON ROUGE — The LSU swimming and diving teams opened the New Year on a positive note by sweeping the UL-Monroe Indians Saturday afternoon at the LSU Natatorium.
The LSU men won 130-84, while the women earned their third victory of the year by a score of 142-68. The men and women combined to win 17-of-26 events on the day. The Tigers upped their all-time record versus the Indians to 39-2.
“Everyone competed very well today and it just nice to get a win,” said LSU associate head coach Lars Jorgensen. “We will have to step it up over the next few weeks but this is a start.”
LSU captured the first nine events of the day, including the men’s and women’s 200-yard medley relays. LSU’s “A” team of Megan Wolters, Lauren Harvey, Heather Brand and Cackey Miltenberger held off LSU’s “B” team to win the 200-yard medley relay with a time of 1:49.96. The LSU men followed that with a victory of their own in the 200 medley relay when Evan Martinec, Robbie Moon, Ryan Cochran and Chris Stanczyk took first place honors with a mark of 1:32.28.
Sophomore Hannah Martin won the 1000-yard freestyle with a time of 10:26.40. The West Monroe native’s time in the 1000 free was a personal-best, knocking nearly 13 seconds off of her previous personal-best mark of 10:39.88 against Texas A&M in 2003. LSU also got an impressive swim from Stephanie Smith in the 200-yard freestyle. The senior, despite suffering from a neck injury, won with a time of 1:53.90.
Freshman Kristin Moon captured the 50-yard freestyle in 24.54, while Jenna Molinski earned the Lady Tigers’ fifth-straight first-place finish of the day by winning the 400-yard individual medley in 4:30.69. Megan Wolters, Margaret Beadle and Margot Gathings also won events during the day.
Jan Minartz knotched another personal victory when he touched the wall .24 of a second ahead of fellow teammate Mark Sisk in the 1000-yard freestyle. Minartz’ time of 9:34.64 was his best of the season. Myles Jaynes won the 200-yard freestyle in 1:42.46, while Ross Hebert held off Evan Martinec in the 50-yard sprint freestyle to win with a time of 21.04. Neil Lowe earned the Tigers’ final win of the day by capturing the 100-yard freestyle in 46.34.
In diving, LSU’s Hali Saucier and Alyson Carlyon continued their impressive freshmen campaigns by combing to win both women’s diving events. In their last outing at the Georgia Invitational, the two qualified for the NCAA Zone Diving Regionals. Saucier won the 1-meter event with a score of 266.40, and then later captured the 3-meter with a personal-best mark of 289.05.
“This is the best group diving performance I have seen out of this new team,” said an elated Tiger diving coach Doug Shaffer. “We had some performances that were better than we have seen all year.”
LSU carried its success into the men’s diving portion of the meet when Adam Hebert, despite a nagging back injury, won the 1-meter competition with a NCAA Zone qualifying score of 301.27. Fellow teammate Andy Crum also qualified for the NCAA Zone Regionals in the 1-meter with a score of 291.37.
“Our Christmas training has paid off and it is getting closer to our championship season,” said Shaffer. “I couldn’t be any happier.”
Saturday’s meet marked the first of a four-meet home stretch. The Tigers return to action this Friday, Jan. 23 when Texas A&M visits the LSU Natatorium for a 4 p.m. dual meet. Admission is free.