The DePauw men's and women's swimming and diving teams traveled to St. Louis for a meet against the Washington University Bears on Saturday.
The men came home with a win, the 155-136 victory over the Bears, while the lady Tigers lost 217-74.
Junior Alexander Alfonso said the meet went very well for the men considering the competition.
"We were up against a re-energized Wash U swim team who has a stellar freshman class of swimmers," he said.
Senior Joseph Hessburg was also pleased with the victory.
"We had quite a few surprise performances along with our usual standout swims," Hessburg said. "What stood out to us was the fact that our guys were racing and touching out Wash U swimmers for the fourth and fifth [place]."
Alfonso aided in the win, finishing first in both the 100 free (47.90) and the 200 individual medley (1:58.73). Junior Casey Hooker helped the Tiger's achieve their 25th win in the 1,000-yard freestyle (9:49.59), the 200 butterfly (1:55.51), and the 500 free (4:41.39).
Another amazing individual feat was junior Cameron Johnson, who dove off the one-meter and three-meter boards, placing second in both events.
"Johnson practiced once for the one-meter and completely winged the three-meter dive. He helped jam the points that Wash U would have otherwise taken because we have no official divers on our roster," Hessburg explained.
The women's team also posted some great times with junior Emily Weber stealing first in the 1000-yard freestyle (10:39.72) and first-year Angela Newlon touching first in the 500 free (5:05.22).
Allison Kirby, a senior on the women's team, said, "The team did pretty well. We did lose the meet, but it gave us an idea of what we need to improve on and what steps we need to take to move forward."
Both Alfonso and Kirby are excited for the upcoming swimming season.
"This was only our second meet and we have many more meets that will prepare us for conference," said Kirby. "We are preparing for the next meet by getting what we need to get done in the water."
Alfonso believes the men's swimming team "is a more mature, cohesive, and motivated team" this year.
Both swimming and diving teams will be competing is Friday night in Springfield, Ohio against Wittenberg University in another dual meet.
"We want to carry our momentum and competitive drive through this meet," Alfonso said.
Hessburg said that Wittenberg isn't a historically strong team, but they are still preparing with "long, tough practices" this week.
"This meet dual meet will allow for a few guys to try out some of their second and third events instead of their usual meet lineup," he said.
Both the men and women's swimming and diving team meets are set to begin at 7 p.m.
