Members of the Idaho dive team participated in Air Force Academy’s Falcon Invitational Friday, while the swim team was defeated on the road at Oregon State University Saturday night.
Idaho sophomore Jamie Sterbis and New Mexico State’s Nicole Brennecke go head-to-head in the 200-yard butterfly Jan. 18. The Idaho swimmers fell to Oregon State in Corvallis Jan. 26 while the divers competed at the Falcon Invitational in Colorado.
At the Falcon Invitational, two Idaho divers, Paige Hunt and Mairin Jameson placed top 20 in the platform dive. Jameson placed 14th with a score of 182.05 while Hunt finished seventh with a score of 204.05. Hunt is the Idaho record-holder in the platform dive with a score of 218.90, a record she set on Mar. 12, 2011. Jameson holds the 10th, 11th and 15th best one-meter dives in school history. She broke her personal record of 176, set about a year ago, in Friday’s competition.
At OSU, despite a 143-119 loss, sophomore star swimmer Rachel Millet placed first in three events for the second meet in a row. Millet accounted for 27 of Idaho’s 119 points and her relay team had to settle for second-place with a time difference of twelve-hundredths of a second in the 200-yard medley relay. Millet finished first in the 100 and 200-yard freestyle and first in the 200-yard individual medley. Millet holds both the 100 and 200-yard freestyle school records.
Freshman butterfly swimmer, Jamie Sterbis, has made a good impression in her first year in Moscow, and finished first in the 100 and 200 butterfly. Last week in the home win against New Mexico State, Sterbis also finished first in the 200 butterfly and helped the 400-yard freestyle relay team to first place, accompanied by Millet.
Junior distance swimmer Sammi Mischkot finished first in the 200-yard backstroke in a tight finish, with first and second place separated by .02 seconds.
Senior Kelsey Saxe has been consistent in finishing second in the 100 and 200-yard breaststroke. In her final home meet of her college career against New Mexico State last week, Saxe swam faster than this week in the 100 breaststroke, but she improved on her time in the 200 breaststroke. Last week Saxe placed second in both events as well.
Despite some consistency and individual accomplishments, the Vandals were generally unsuccessful in key relay races. OSU won in the 200-yard medley relay put the team at an early 11-4 lead. In the final event, OSU topped off the win with first place in the 400-yard freestyle relay.
“We had some strong swims but we came up just short,” said Idaho coach Mark Sowa.
The Vandals were unable to capitalize in most long distance races, losing the 1,000-yard freestyle, 500-yard freestyle and 400-yard freestyle and earning very few points in those races.
“It was just a little, too late,” Sowa said.
After a loss to the Beavers, the Vandals drop to a 4-4 dual-meet record. The Vandals will meet Washington State University Friday in Pullman. WSU is 4-5 on the year after defeating OSU last Friday.
Aaron Wolfe can be reached at [email protected]