BY JULIA KLEIN ’21
“I feel like we all swam and dove our hearts out and left it all on the pool deck,” Sarah Ratzlaff ’20 said, when asked about Mount Holyoke College Swim and Dive’s last dual meet of the season against the Smith College Pioneers on Feb. 8.
The meet was held at Smith College’s Dalton Pool. The Smith College Swim and Dive team put up posters for each of the seniors on the team, as well as one big poster for the Lyons’ Swim and Dive seniors.
The meet began with a ceremony to honor both the Smith College seniors as well as the Mount Holyoke seniors. Smith College’s seniors were acknowledged and a short summary was read about each of them, stating their plans for the future as well as their contributions to their program during their time on the team. In addition, a rose was presented to each Smith senior, as well as to each of the Mount Holyoke seniors, Natalie Burkett ’20, Ally Dunlap ’20, Samantha Nemivant ’20, Sarah Ratzlaff ’20, Olivia Vejcik ’20 and Jane Zhang ’20.
“For us seniors, it was our last dual meet ever, which was a bittersweet moment,” Nemivant said. “As the team is gearing up for NEWMACs [New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference], it’s really starting to set in that us seniors will be done with our collegiate athletic careers soon.”
The meet started off with the 200-yard medley relay. Anais Magner ’23, Erin Schrama ’23, Tamara Mukulu ’21 and Caitlin Richmond ’21 came in second place with a time of 1:58.31.
In the 1000-yard freestyle, Ratzlaff was the first Lyon to finish, coming in fourth overall with a time of 12:22.72.
Mount Holyoke College bagged a few first place finishes on Saturday. Schrama placed first in the 200 yard freestyle with a time of 2:07.29 and Magner won both the 100-yard backstroke with a time of 1:04.97 and the 200-yard backstroke at 2:22.01.
Richmond finished second in the 50- yard freestyle coming in at 26.26 seconds, followed by Riley Hicks ’21 in fourth with a time of 28.77 seconds. In the 100-yard freestyle, Mukulu placed second overall at 57.67 seconds, followed by Richmond in fourth at 1:00.85.
Rounding out the swimming section of the meet was Lauren Leese ’23 who took second in the individual medley with 2:27.43. Schrama, Naomi Brown ’21, Mukulu and Richmond came second in the 400 freestyle relay with a time of 3:55.45.
In the diving portion of the meet, on the one-meter board Nemivant received a nationally qualifying score of 268.64, followed by Kathryn Murphy ’22 who gained a spot in the NCAA DIII Diving Regionals with a score of 249.51. Nemivant also won the three-meter dive with a score of 264.40, followed by Katie Kolozsvari ’21 with a score of 237.30.
The Lyons lost to the Pioneers 184- 116. Up next for the Lyons is the New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) Swimming and Diving Championships at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) beginning Thursday, Feb. 20.