THE BASICS:
- Event: 2020 NEWMAC Championship
- Results: 1st of 10 (476.50 points) - After Day Two
- Location: Cambridge, Mass. (Zesiger Sports and Fitness Center Pool)
- The Lead: On the second day of the 2020 New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) Swimming and Diving Championship, the MIT women's 200-free relay team smashed the NEWMAC meet, NEWMAC open, MIT pool and MIT program record with a swim of 1:33.30 tonight. The Engineers won four events contested tonight to extend their lead in the team standings.
MIT currently leads with 476.50 points and is followed by Wheaton College with 293, Springfield College with 270, Wellesley College with 241.50 and Coast Guard with 240.50.
HOW IT HAPPENED:
- The 200-free relay 'A' team comprised of sophomore Shannon Hagmaier (Longwood, Fla.), junior Olivia McGrath (Chevy Chase, Md.), senior Lilia Staszel (Brighton, Mich.) and sophomore Lindsey Bjornstad (Mequon, Wis.) began tonight's finals session by breaking the NEWMAC Meet, NEWMAC Open, MIT program and MIT pool records with a first place finish and an NCAA 'B' cut time of 1:33.30. They bested their prelims swim that included first-year Edenna Chen (Colorado Springs, Colo.) by 1.25-seconds. The time of 1:33.30 currently stands fifth best in Division III.
- The 200-free relay 'B' team comprised of sophomore Laura Rosado (New Haven, Conn.), senior Kayla Holman (Menlo Park, Calif.), junior Hannah Mahaffey (Lawrenceville, Ga.) and senior Delaney Burns (Scituate, Mass.) won the consolation final with a time of 1:36.39.
- In the 500-free, the Engineers had three student-athletes compete in tonight's session. First-year Callie Kunz (Woodbury, Minn.) finished fifth in 5:06.33, classmate Caroline Warren (Scotch Plains, N.J.) finished sixth in 5:07.93 and first-year Jennifer Xiong (Buffalo Grove, Ill.) finished 15th in 5:17.14. All three times were improvements from this morning's preliminary session.
- The Engineers had three student-athletes in the championship final of the 200-IM guided by a third-place finish by Mahaffey in a time of 2:06.80. Chen finished fourth in 2:07.50, while first-year Angelina Zhang (New York, N.Y.) finished fifth in 2:07.99. Sophomore Jasmin Bouzarouata (Astoria, N.Y.) claimed the consolation final with a time of 2:11.44.
- Five Engineers scored in the championship final of the 50-free led by a first-place finish and an NCAA 'B' cut by Hagmaier in 23.62. Bjornstad placed second in 23.79, McGrath placed fifth in 24.09, Staszel placed sixth in 24.18 and Burns placed seventh in 24.26.
- In the diving well, MIT swept the top two spots on the 3-meter board. Junior Deborah Wen (Honolulu, Hawaii) claimed the league title with a diving regional qualifying score of 526.85, while senior Blake Zhou (Palo Alto, Calif.) took home Second Team All-Conference honors with a qualifying score of 517.75. In addition, first-year Katelin Du (Scarsdale, N.Y.) placed seventh with 434.15 points, a third qualifying score for MIT.
- The final event of the night was the 400-medley relay which saw Rosado, Chen, Mahaffey and Hagmaier take home the gold with a time of 3:46.07. The quartet took 2.74-seconds off their prelim time from this morning.
UP NEXT:
- The Engineers return to the pool tomorrow morning for the third day of the 2020 NEWMAC Championship. Swimming prelims begin at 10:00 am and finals start at 6:00 pm. Events scheduled for tomorrow include the 400-IM, 100-fly, 200-free, 100-breast, 100-back and 200-medley relay.
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