Jan. 31, 2004
ATLANTA – The Georgia Tech men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams cruised to victory this afternoon over Emory, 158-133 men, 160-122 women, on Senior Day in the Georgia Tech Aquatic Center. Seniors led the way for the Yellow Jackets as Paul McCarty (Ypsilanti, Mich.) set a new school record on the one-meter springboard, tallying NCAA Zone qualifying marks on both the one- and three-meter boards with scores of 335.09 and 352.95. Senior Eduardo Oliver (Jacksonville, Fla.) posted a first-place finish in the 1000-yard freestyle with a time of 9:41.49 and fellow senior Itai Eden (Qiryat-Ono, Israel) finished first in the 200 butterfly with a time of 1:52.90. Tech improves to 4-7 on the season.
“We were very pleased with our performance today,” said head coach Seth Baron. “We had the opportunity to swim our athletes in their second and third events to see how far along we are in our preparation for the ACC Championships. I was happy for the seniors who all won events today. Paul broke two school records and I was proud of our 400 freestyle relay team who improved three seconds today.”
Sophomore diver Laurissa Prystaj (Fairport, N.Y.) swept the diving events for the Jackets, breaking her own school record on the three-meter board with a score of 299.25. Prystaj scored 278.85 points on the one-meter board.
Freshmen Vesna Stojanovska (Skopje, Macedonia) and Alison Walker (Marietta, Ga.) tallied two victories apiece for the Jackets. Stojanovska tallied wins in the 200-yard butterfly (2:08.38) and 1000 free (10:25.04), while Walker posted times of 1:05.70 and 2:24.78 to capture the 100 and 200 breaststroke events for the Rambling Wreck.
Junior Anna Saum (Toledo, Ohio) took first in two events for Tech in the 100 and 200 backstroke events. Saum posted times of 58.68 and 2:07.29. Sprint freestyler Teemu Kettunen (Jarvenpaa, Finland) tallied a Tech season-best time of 21.11 to capture the 50 free for the Yellow Jackets.
Junior Ann Battle (Alexandria, Va.) picked up her first win of the season in the 500 free for Tech with a time of 5:08.43. Sophomores Elizabeth Foster (Frankfort, Ky.), Brian Huff (Marietta, Ga.) and Jacob Wilson (Kingwood, Texas) registered wins for the Jackets. Foster and Wilson swept the 200 free for Tech with times of 1:55.00 and 1:45.01, respectively. Huff tallied a win in the 100 free with a time of 47.23.
Tech rookies Ryan Bishop (Signal Mountain, Tenn.), Natanya Harper (Atlanta, Ga.) and Alex Williams (Indianapolis, Ind.) rounded out individual first-place finishers for the Yellow Jackets. Bishop captured the 200 breast and 200 individual medley events with times of 2:06.00 and 1:55.10. Harper posted a first-place time of 52.92 in the 100 free, while Williams finished first in the 100 breast with a time of 59.09.
The women’s 200 medley relay team of Ashley Kracke (Vestavia Hills, Ala.), Walker, Jill Vukmanic (Brookville, Md.) and Dana West (Brookeville, Md.) finished first with a time of 1:51.08. The men’s 400 free relay team of Huff, Jason Howard (Snellville, Ga.), Ryan Riebesell (Hoover, Ala.) and Kettunen set a new pool record with a time of 3:04.28.
Tech will travel to Charlottesville, Va., for the women’s ACC Championships Feb. 18-21. The men’s ACC Championships will take place at UVa as well from Feb. 25-28.
