Oct. 15, 2010

Complete Results

Contact: Dan Carr

CLEVELAND, Ohio - The women's team broke two school records and the men won every race as both swimming and diving teams swept their first opponents of the 2010-11 season in their opener at the Busbey Natatorium on Friday night (Oct. 15).

The Vikings hosted men's and women's teams from Gannon and Niagara and women's teams from Butler and St. Francis.

The men beat Gannon 218.0-78.0 and defeated Niagara 221.0-79.0 to begin the season 2-0.

CSU's women improved to 4-0, defeating Gannon 223.0-70.0; Niagara 245.0-55.0; Butler 250.0-42.0; and St. Francis 181.0-113.0.

"We just had fantastic performances across the board," head coach Wally Morton said. "In the past six years our women had not defeated St. Francis, and tonight they just came out and gave an outstanding, dominant performance."

Alice Sommerville set two school records during the meet. She was part of the 200 yard medley relay team that won in 1:47.82, beating the old CSU mark of 1:47.86. Sommerville also won the 100 fly in 55.75, beating her own school record time of 56.81 by over a full second.

"Setting two school records is almost unheard of in the first meet," Morton said. Carys Behn, Joanna Olsson and Kacey Cummings also turned in very strong performances for the Vikings.

Behn won every event in which she swam, and was an instrumental part of the record-breaking 200 medley relay squad. Olsson picked up three individual event wins, and helped the 200 freestyle relay team to a win. Cummings won the one meter and three meter diving events.

Freshman Alexandra Johansson made a strong impact in her first meet, being a member of both winning relay teams and picking up an individual win in the 100 back.

The men's team also turned in a number of outstanding performances, winning every event of the night.

Mark de Swardt, who won three events at the Horizon League Championship last spring, began this season where he left off, winning the 1,000 yard free and 500 free. Graham Thoresen and Zvonimir Androic also picked up individual wins. Thoresen took first in the 200 free, while Androic won the 100 back and 200 back.

Berry Thompson also had a great first meet, winning the 100 free and helping the 200 free relay and the 200 medley relay teams to victories.

"Thompson's split in the 200 medley was 19.61, and anything under 20 seconds is great," Morton said. "He's somebody who had a very good first meet."

Freshman Brian Ferro had a very impressive first meet, taking home victories in the 200 breast, and100 breast events. He also placed second in the 200 IM, which was won by teammate and fellow freshman Justin Kermack.

"All around this was a good opener," Morton said. "There's a lot of room for improvement. There were some technical flaws, and other things to correct. The enthusiasm was great and the energy was good, though, and we swam well for it being our first meet of the season."

Morton attributed the team's success to a very good week of training.

"We've been working extremely hard this week," Morton said. "April Woo (who is in charge of the team's conditioning) was the coach of the meet. She did a great job getting both our sprinters and our distance swimmer prepared for tonight."

Both the men and the women will be on the road next week, as Cleveland State will travel to face its first two conference opponents of the season. The Vikings will compete at Valparaiso on Friday (Oct. 22) at 1:00 p.m. and then will face Green Bay on Saturday (Oct. 23) at noon.