The University of Idaho swim center erupted as UI and Washington State University swimmers approached the final 100 yards of the 1,000-meter freestyle, with four laps to decide the winner.
WSU freshman Avery Bulkley had controlled the tempo for the first 900 yards. But sophomore Marie Mason was hitting her stride. After gliding through the pool’s lengths, Mason kicked into high gear and began to pull away.
Mason executed her final flip turn and surged to the wall, using her endurance and speed to not only claim first place but shatter her own school record, set earlier this season, with a time of 10:08.85.
Mason, has had a breakout season for the Vandals and has been consistently one of their best swimmers all season and has a bright future in the black and gold.
“Marie loves to be at the pool every day,” head coach Dr. Mark Sowa said. “You can see that focus when she comes in. She’s intellectually curious. She loves being in the water. She loves being around her teammates. Frankly, she loves working hard and discovering new things. She’s had a tremendous sophomore campaign, her confidence grows every time she gets up on to the starting block. She’s going to have a great end of her season come the end of February.”
Despite Mason’s heroics, the Cougars dominated the rest of the meet, rolling to their second consecutive victory over the Vandals, 178-84, and finishing their regular season 4-5.
After a difficult meet the previous night in Pullman, where the Cougars defeated the Vandals 210-54, Idaho hoped to bounce back on their home deck. But the outcome proved largely similar.
The UI swim center took on added significance as an emotional senior day meet began. Idaho recognized eight seniors swimming their final home meet as Vandals: Madelyn Butler, Cadence Gabel, Ginger Kiefer, Avery Keinonen, Mckenzie Kovalscik, Amelia Perkins, Grace Ruble, Bethany Rahn and diver Maya Salvitti, who competed at her senior diving meet at Northern Arizona.
“They’ve been tremendous performers,” Sowa said. “If you look at our top 10 times, the top 10 performances, those names are all over them. But they mean more to us as people and as Vandals than names on a record board. They’ve brought leadership to this team;, they’ve brought love and caring to this team. They brought class and dignity to this team, and they will be tremendously missed.”
From the opening event, Washington State showed their talent, claiming first and second place at nearly every turn. Idaho fought back, drawing confidence from Mason’s early victory.
Kiefer, who won the individual medley the previous night, touched the wall second in both the 100- and 200-yard backstroke.
Butler, competing in her final event at the UI swim center, returned the Vandals to the win column with a first-place finish in the 100-yard breaststroke (55.43).
Other top Vandal performers included junior Helen Schumaker (second in 100-yard butterfly, 58.23), sophomore Jaidan Engle (third in 100-yard butterfly, 58.87), sophomore Courtney Crawford (second in 100-yard breaststroke), Ruble (third in 200-yard butterfly), junior Isabelle Borke (third in 100-yard freestyle, 52.25), and sophomore Holly Lenarz (third in 500-yard freestyle, 5:02.27).
As the meet wound down to its final two events, all eyes turned to the 200-yard individual medley and the gold-capped swimmer in lane four: Ginger Kiefer.
Kiefer has earned countless accolades throughout her Vandal career, and this would be her final race in the black and gold at her home pool.
The pool fell silent. When the horn sounded, the swimmers dove in, but there was no contest. No one would stand in Kiefer’s way. She glided down the pool with increasing speed, and as she turned for her final 25 yards, she blew past everyone and touched the wall with a pool record of 2:02.09. Junior Natalie Charles finished third in the same event with a time of 2:07.58.
“It’s tough to sum that up. Ginger is special,” Sowa said. “She’s got tremendous skills. She loves being in the water every day, and when she believes that she’s good, she can beat just about anybody. She’s been a pleasure to work with. People think that it comes easy to her. It doesn’t. Everything that she’s achieved, she’s had to give tremendous effort. She’s going to be missed as well.”
The result wasn’t what the Vandals hoped for to cap their regular season, but the reminder of all the hard work and hours spent in the pool made it worthwhile for Sowa and his team.
“We always talk about, ‘Know why you do this every day? Why do you come to the pool every day?’ And we challenge them with that,” Sowa said. “The beauty of it is that it brings out the positivity in them. We came back on Dec. 27 to an empty campus to train for two weeks with nobody here. It would be very easy for them to feel sorry for themselves. And on the contrary, we grew as a team. We got better as a team, and that’s what I’m proudest of.”
The Vandals will have nearly a month to train before heading to the MPSF championships in Pharr, Texas, Feb. 25-28.