The Arizona swim team defeated the Wisconsin Badgers in their dual meet last Friday at Hillenbrand Aquatic Center with the winning scores of 187-74 for men and 158-104 for women.
On the women’s side, freshman Margo Geer continued to live up to her high expectations of being a newcomer to watch out for. Being in the limelight isn’t foreign territory for Geer, who also stood out in her home state of Ohio. However, having a supportive team that pushes her is new for the swimmer.
“”I came from a really small swim team,”” Geer said. “”Actually, I was the only swimmer on my high school team, so I’m not really used to having a team back me up all the time. So it’s been really nice to have that — a great experience really.””
Fueled by her competitive nature and team’s support, each meet is important for Geer.
“”We race hard every meet,”” she said. “”Every meet has just been a great opportunity, but we’ve been focusing on Texas.””
On Friday, Geer won three freestyle events for Arizona: the 200 yard in 1:49.21, the 100 yard in 49.30 and the 50 yard in 22.75. All three times are considered to be NCAA “”B”” cut times.
Moreover, she rounded out the 200 free relay team that also won their event.
Regardless of her notable performances, Geer stays modest and admits to having faults. She’s constantly trying to improve her form.
“”We actually started working on my starts and my turns for sprinting,”” Geer said. “”We’ve been working on that a lot since I’ve gotten here, and they’ve already improved.””
Another swimmer who made NCAA consideration times was captain Alyssa Anderson. The junior won the 500- and 1,000-yard freestyle races for the women, and the 400-yard I.M. Her finishing time of 4.48.74 in the 500y is also NCAA-worthy.
For the men’s team, the Wildcats’ didn’t even let the Badgers’ get past a hundred points thanks to strong performances by junior captain Cory Chitwood, sophomore Carl Mickelson and freshman Matt Barber.
Chitwood won two events and contributed to a medley win. He won his national title race, the 200-yard backstroke, in 1:48.10, and the 200y freestyle in 1:40.19. Additionally, he was the leadoff leg for the 400y-medley relay win.
Both Mickelson and Barber also had two individual race wins.
Mickelson dominated the breaststroke events by winning both the 100y and 200y with times of 56.24 and 2:01.53, respectively.
While Mickelson handled the breaststroke, Barber took control of the freestyle events, winning both the 500y free in 4:37.40 and the 1,000y free in 9:35.10.
Head coach Frank Busch’s prediction of the Wisconsin women’s team being a greater power than the men’s was sound. The proof was in the scores.
“”As a whole, we swam a lot better,”” Busch said. “”All and all, I feel like we competed really well in both teams. This week is going to be a different story, we are going up against two really good teams, UCLA and USC.””
USC Diving Invitational
The Arizona diving team was in Los Angeles this past weekend to compete in the USC Diving Invitational.
By the end of the tournament on Saturday, five of the top eight finishers were Arizona divers, including Andres Guerra, Sean Clark, David Austin, Ainsley Oliver and Samantha Pickens.
