Women’s swimming, diving win opening meet for third straight year

Opening up the 2012-2013 season, the NYU women’s swimming and diving team defeated the State University of New York at Cortland 173-123. The victory marks NYU’s third straight win over SUNY Cortland in the last three years.

In the first event of the meet, freshman Caitie Hawthorne, junior Nina Rusiewski and seniors Savanna Keator and Claire Stephens won the 200-yard medley relay (1:53.78).

Junior Gabrielle Borutecene was victorious in the 1,000-yard freestyle, finishing in just under 11 minutes (10:56.68). Borutecene also finished first in the 200-yard individual medley (2:16.50).

Rusiewski claimed her first individual victory in the 200-yard freestyle (1:59.50).

In the 100-yard backstroke, sophomore Silke Herold grabbed first place with a time of 1:04.26, edging out SUNY Cortland’s junior Abigail MacDonald by less than one second.

Keator blazed past her opponents in the 100-yard breaststroke, winning by almost three full seconds (1:09.13).

Sophomore freestyle specialist Emily Doerner dominated her competition in both the 50-yard freestyle (24.93) and 100-yard freestyle (53.98). Doerner also won the 100-yard butterfly (1:00.46).

“Individually I’d like to make NCAA cuts, and as a team we want to get as many qualifiers as possible,” Doerner said.

In the one-meter diving event, NYU freshman Nealy Wallis beat out sophomore teammate Kate Donnelly to claim first place. To add on to the freshman’s highly laudable performance in her first collegiate meet, Wallis also won the women’s three-meter diving event by 13.80 points.

Next up for the women’s swimming and diving team is a trip to Rochester, N.Y., for the University of Rochester Invitational on Oct. 25 and Oct. 26.

A version of this article appeared in the Monday, Oct. 22 print edition. Nicholas Nemeroff is a contributing writer. Email him at sports@nyunews.com.