BATON ROUGE — The LSU women’s swimming and diving team completed a sweep of Houston, Rice and New Orleans as the final day of a quad meet came to a close at the LSU Natatorium on Saturday afternoon.
The Lady Tigers defeated Rice, 216-131, while also downing Houston, 233-120 and UNO, 283-63. The Owls knocked off their cross town rival Cougars, 189-152. Rice also beat the Privateers by a 255-59 decision. Houston defeated UNO, 237-99.
LSU held significant leads on all three teams heading into the day, and the Lady Tigers increased the advantage by winning four events — highlighted by a 1-2-3 finish in the 100 free — and a sweep of both relays.
“The big thing is that we overcame some adversity,” said head coach Adam Schmitt. “We were trying to get over some illnesses and injuries. The main objective for the team was to compete, race and get their hands on the wall before someone else, and I think they did that.”
With the three victories, LSU (6-4) secured its second straight winning season in meet competition. The Lady Tigers also stretched their perfect record over UNO to 7-0 and won their 16th straight decision against Houston.
“Everyone did a good job of stepping up to get these wins in our last meet,” said Schmitt. “We’re above .500 now with the wins, which gives up some confidence going into the SEC Championships.”
LSU continued its momentum from Friday night as the Lady Tigers’ 400 medley relay squad of Katie Gilmore, Signe Larson, Colleen Bertirotti and Sabrina Messmer won convincingly (3:50.10).
LSU’s sweep of relays was complete when Bertirotti, Gilmore, Messmer and Katherine Noland posted a clocking of 1:33.55 in the 200 freestyle relay to close the meet.
Noland, Gilmore and Bertirotti led the 1-2-3 finish in the 100 free. Noland’s time of 51.08 bested Gilmore by .25 seconds (51.33) and Bertirotti’s clocking of 52.34.
“It was really great this weekend,” said Gilmore. “We can look forward to SECs, and it is just a good foreshadowing of what’s to come in the next two weeks and after that.”
Larson won the 100 breaststroke in a clocking of 1:04.99, and sophomore Sarah Bedell was third (1:06.52). Bedell was the Lady Tigers’ highest finisher in the 400 individual medley with a fourth-place finish (4:39.01).
Sophomore Berit Aljand finished second in the 200 backstroke (2:05.61).
The SEC Diving Championships get underway next Friday and conclude on Sunday in Lexington, Ky. The SEC Swimming Championships take place the following week, Feb. 7-10.
Final Scores
LSU 216, Rice 131
LSU 233, Houston 120
LSU 283, UNO 63
Rice 189, Houston 152
Rice 255, UNO 59
Houston 237, UNO 99