CLEVELAND, Ohio- After successful fall seasons, the men and women swimming and diving teams have winning records (5-4) as they enter the last half of the season.
Cleveland State had outstanding performances from many swimmers and divers through the first half of the season. Sophomore Jodi Turk dominated the distance events in dual meets, posting 10 wins so far on the year. In diving, Danny Roberts has tallied 10 wins and Sammie Sposet has seven first place victories. CSU also had three swimmers that had school record times that were broken by Alex Lewis, Nathan Grant, and Madisen Tretter. Lewis had a record time in the 50 free (19.99), 100 free (44.24), and in the 100 fly (48.11), while Grant had one in the 200 breast (1:59.67), and in the 200 breast (1:59.67), and Tretter also had one in the 200 breast (2:17.74).
Throughout the first part of the season, Cleveland State had two divers and one swimmer nominated as Horizon League Athletes of the Week. Lewis earned swimmer of the week on Nov. 26. Roberts earned two diver of the week awards on Nov. 19 and Nov. 26, while Sammie Sposet was named Horizon League Diver of the Week on Nov. 12.
In the Magnus Cup Invitational, both the men and women finished runner-up. The top winners through the weekend were Lewis who won the 50 and 100 free, sophomore Adam Ingledew won the 200 free, Tretter finished atop in the 100 breast, Grant had a pair of first place finishes in the 100 and 200 breast, and Alexandra Johansson finished atop in the 100 fly.
At the 2013 AT&T U.S. Winter National Championships eight Cleveland State swimmers (Gage Alleman, Grant, Justin Kermack, Lewis, Ingledew, Al Shillito, Johansson, and Tretter) competed in the prestigious swimming events against top national talent. Throughout the three-day event, CSU had five U.S. National finalists. Lewis, Grant, Kermack, Ingledew, and Shillito all finaled in their individual events or relays. Kermack had the highest finish at 14th in an individual event (200 butterfly) going 1:46.80 twice at the U.S. Nationals. The men made the finals in the relays of the 400 Medley, 400 Free, 200 Free and 200 Medley.
Four CSU freshman that had a tremendous first half of the season were Rowan Elbadry, Tretter, Robert Tolson, and Patrick Walsh. Elbadry on the year has 14 victories in dual meet competition. Tretter is filling a tremendous need on the team with incredible improvement in the breastroke events. Tolson is stepping up as one of the top sprinters in his freshman year. Also, Patrick Walsh has had a solid freshman year for the Vikings and is one of the top distance swimmers on the team.
Wally Morton said, "With 20 new student-athletes on the team, the fall was the hunting and gathering phase. We hunted for ways for them to get better and gathered up the knowledge required to ultimately swim very fast. We had some amazing barriers broken this fall with Alex Lewis going under 20 in the 50 free; Nathan Grant going under two minutes in the 200 breast and Madisen Tretter going under 2:18 in the 200 breast," said Morton.
Morton added, "Their best performances are ahead of them. This was one of our toughest and most challenging early season schedules, yet we came up with a winning record. Our workouts contained increased volume and intensity in the early phase of our training and as a result we will swim and dive great at the end of the season."
The Vikings will be out of action until Sunday, Jan. 5 as the Vikings will travel out of the country to Puerto Rico. The Vikings will compete in the 2014 10th Anniversary Copa Coqui Puerto Rico Winter Swimming Holiday Invitational.
