Heading into the fourth final day of the ACC Championships, the Virginia women’s swimming and diving team had a narrow 90.5 point first-place lead over North Carolina State University. However, there was no looking back for the No. 5 Cavaliers (8-0, 4-0 ACC) once they took the lead on the second day.
Winning four events on the final day of competition in Greensboro, N.C., Virginia clinched its ninth straight ACC Championship.
When the last event wrapped up Saturday, Virginia put up 1,332.5 points. NC State took second place with a score of 1,178 points and North Carolina followed up with 1,080.
“All 20 women stepped up and gave incredible effort, incredible attitude and incredible performance,” Virginia coach Augie Busch said.
Throughout the competition, the team won a total of 10 events, broke five school records and, on Saturday in the 1,650 free, junior Leah Smith broke the NCAA record with a time of 15:25.30.
“It was really cool to look at the sidelines and see my teammates going crazy,” she said. “Even though it was a tough race, they really pushed me through it.”
Similarly, senior Courtney Bartholomew put up a noteworthy performance in her final ACC Championship. Emerging a four-time champion in the 100 back on Friday and in the 200 back on Saturday, Bartholomew became the fifth ACC swimmer to win two individual events four times. Additionally, with her victory in the 200 IM Thursday, she claimed her ninth ACC individual title — the most in program history and tied for second most in conference history.
However, according to Bartholomew, it was racing for her team that served as the ultimate motivation.
“It’s always easier to swim for the team rather than individually,” Bartholomew said. “Knowing that the last title was going to be for the team was really special.”
For Busch, he was unsurprised by the performances of his top two simmers.
“Leah and Courtney did what they do,” Busch said. “They just continue to shock us every time get the chance to race.”
Last year, Virginia went into the last day of competition in second place behind North Carolina. Although Virginia had the lead at this year’s meet, this made the team only work harder, Bartholomew said.
“While we were ahead, that means that you have a target on your back,” Bartholomew said, “And having a target on your back means that you need to work a little bit harder because everyone’s gunning for you.”
Placing fifth at last year’s NCAA Championships, the Virginia women made the tournament a priority before the start of this season. However, that goal did not distract the team from the tournament in front of them.
“We have a lot of other goals for this season, so those are on our mind,” Smith said. “But we knew we needed to take care of business at the ACC Championship.”
With the NCAA Championships being the team’s ultimate goal, Busch put his team through intensive workouts leading up to this meet. Now with the conference title, Busch is going to rest his swimmers to prepare them for a run at a national championship.
“This is really the fun part of swimming: when we start resting for championship season and start gearing up to go really fast at [the NCAA Championships],” Smith said.
Achieving its ninth consecutive ACC championship, Bartholomew is now focused on achieving the team’s main goal: receiving a NCAA trophy.
“Going into [the NCAA Championships], I really would like to bring home a trophy for this team [by having] our team make top four,” Bartholomew said.
For Busch, in addition to earning a trophy, he wants to make history for the program once again.
“We want to be top four,” Busch said. “We were fifth last year, that was the best in program history, and we want to be the best in program history again.”
The Virginia women will be on the water again starting March 16 at the NCAA Championships in Atlanta, Ga.
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