by Katie Keith
Staff Writer
On February 1, the Sewanee Tigers Swim & Dive team headed to Atlanta for a duel meet with top ranked Emory. This was the last regular meet of the season, as the Southern Athletic Association (SAA) Conference Championships begin on February 13. While the Tigers swam hard and had many spectacular finishes, the final scores were 137-84 for the women and 115-79 for the men, both favoring Emory.
Despite the overall loss, many Tigers saw success in the pool. Caty Hueske and Parker Goss (C’17) gave their all in the women’s 100 Free finishing first and second respectively. Sewanee also took the top two finishes in the men’s 100 Free with co-captain Brian Glatt (C’15) taking spot number one with teammate William Ralston (C’16) coming in 4 seconds behind him. It proved to be a challenging meet, but co-captain Scott Wise (C’14) had the following to say about team morale: “the goal of swimming Emory was to give the team experience competing against the best of the best, so there was really nothing to lose. Emory is a great team, and a lot of us swam better than expected. This simply gave us a better perspective for how to prepare for the competition at conference next week.”
Sewanee shone on the diving board at this meet. Frazier Devany (C’16) earned the team’s first win in the men’s 3-meter competition, finishing with a score of 174.68 points. But Devany was not the only Tiger to have a good day on the 3-meter. Winston Westbrook (C’17) took second for the Tigers in the same event with the score of 143.03 points. The men also swept the one-meter competition later on in the meet, with Courtney Moore (C’16) finishing first and followed by Devany and David Evans (C’15).
In the coming days, the Tigers will be heading to the Birmingham Crossplex for the SAA Championships. The Tigers have had a strong season, and sophomore Jackson Cromer noted that the team has been up against some of the best teams in the country, like Emory and Washington University, and added that he “feels extremely confident going into conference and am ready for the team to swim well. We’ve all put in the hard work and now it’s time to see the rewards.”