To the surprise of many, the Virginia women’s swimming and diving team provided the same heart-pounding action against North Carolina as they did a year ago. Only this time around, the Cavaliers found themselves on the wrong side of the outcome.
Down 138.5-125.5 with just two events remaining, Virginia needed a 1-2 finish in the 200-yard individual medley followed by a victory in the 400-yard freestyle relay to avoid the upset.
Junior Courtney Bartholomew and senior Ellen Williamson gave the Aquatic and Fitness Center crowd life when they successfully completed the first step, but the ensuing Virginia relay team — made up mostly of distance swimmers instead of sprinters — finished just over a second shy of the victory.
The No. 6 Lady Cavaliers (3-2, 1-1 ACC) ultimately fell by a score of 156.5-143.5 against the No. 18 North Carolina women (5-1, 3-0 ACC). Meanwhile, the No. 21 Virginia men (1-5, 0-2 ACC) saw their hopes for victory end much earlier, as they endured a 192-106 loss against the Tar Heels (4-2, 3-0 ACC).
Coach Augie Busch described his athletes’ individual performances as “hit and miss” in their senior day meet, emphasizing that his team lacked the overall sharpness and energy of North Carolina.
But such disheartening results should not have been a huge surprise due to the Cavaliers’ brutal training regimen throughout this past month. While the athletes and fans circle the North Carolina date when the schedule is released, Busch does not taper for dual meets, instead focusing on the championship competitions.
“You could obviously tell UNC prepared for this meet and we didn’t,” junior Yannick Kaeser said.
Still, even though the Virginia women would have certainly preferred another shot at several events — especially the 100-yard freestyle in which North Carolina claimed a 1-2-3 sweep — several individuals contributed praiseworthy performances.
For the Lady Cavaliers –— who won nine of the meet’s 16 events — the 200-yard medley relay team of Bartholomew, sophomore Laura Simon, Williamson and sophomore Ellen Thomas clocked in a new AFC record with a time of 1:39.02.
Later, Simon broke the pool record with a time of 2:12.22 in the 200-yard breaststroke; she also won the 100-yard event. Fellow sophomore Leah Smith won both the 500 and 1,650-yard freestyle events, including coming in just over 35 seconds faster than freshman teammate Jessie Gvozdas in the near mile-long event.
But the efforts of Bartholomew were perhaps the most impressive of the day. The junior broke the pool record with a time 1:54.03 in the 200-yard backstroke, only after racing to a jaw-dropping, midseason time of 51:56 in her 100-yard backstroke victory.
“That’s the first time I’ve ever seen a non-suited person break 52 [seconds] in the 100-[yard] backstroke,” Busch said.
On the men’s side, Kaeser continued his reign of dominance by claiming first in both the 100 and 200-yard breaststroke, keeping his undefeated streak alive in 100 and 200-yard dual meet breaststroke events.
With the presence of just three seniors on the team, Kaeser views his individual success as a lead-by-example approach to the youthful Cavalier men.
“I feel that by performing well, I can probably give the team the comfort that they can count on me whether it is with the 100-breast and 200,” Kaeser said. “I just try to do my best.”
The other standout performance came from freshman Brendan Casey in the 1650. A little over a month after claiming a time of 15:31.81 in the Georgia Fall Invitational — a meet for which Virginia tapered — a physically tired Casey clocked in at 15:16.90 on Saturday, drawing recognition from his coach.
“He just crushed his time [from] when he was shaved at Georgia,” Busch said. “He could break 15 minutes at the end of the season, which would be unbelievable.”
But regardless of individual outcomes, an aura of disappointment seemed to be cast over the Virginia performance against their rivals. However, the swimmers were able to put the meet into context.
The Cavalier swimmers, especially the women, echoed Busch’s sentiment that in the long run, Saturday’s loss might be a blessing in disguise. In the coming weeks, the ever-talented ladies expect to show resolve in firming out the kinks in what they hope to prove was an outlier performance.
“If the end goal was to win this dual meet, we could win it, but the end goal is NCAA’s,” Williamson said. “A little bit of a shock right now will be better later when we can be more prepared and perform well at NCAA’s.”
The Virginia divers will return to action on Feb. 7 at the Cavalier Diving Invitational, while the Cavalier swimmers that will not compete in the ACC championships will take to the pool Feb. 8 at the Virginia Tech Invitational.
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