Jayhawks close regular season with victory at Iowa State
AMES, Iowa – The Kansas swimming and diving team leaves Ames, Iowa, with a 178.5-121.5 victory over the Cyclones, to close out its regular season, Saturday, Feb. 3, at Beyer Pool.
The two-day dual meet started Friday night where Kansas kicked it into gear with five wins in a row, leading to a total of six first-place finishes out of the eight events on the slate. That helped the Jayhawks to a 19-point advantage heading into Saturday morning’s competition.
“We competed really well and we won some close races,” head coach Clark Campbell said. “We are finishing in areas well and got off to a good start.”
Freshman Manon Manning, sophomore Haley Downey, junior Haley Bishop and freshman Lauryn Parrish posted the first win of the meet for the Jayhawks in the 200-medley relay with a time of 1:45.04.
Immediately following, sophomore Jenny Nusbaum won the 1,000-yard freestyle by over eight seconds, swimming the second-fastest time of her season at 10:15.08. Parish followed with a gold in the 200-yard freestyle (1:51.92), Manning with a first in the 100-yard backstroke (56.72), Downey with the top spot in the 100-yard breaststroke (1:04.72) and Bishop concluded the night with a gold as well in the 50-yard freestyle (23.86).
“Bishop did great in the 50-free and also the 200-medley relay, Nusbaum had a great 1,000-yard freestyle and (sophomore) Elizabeth Amato-Hanner had a really fantastic day,” Campbell said. “She was in our ‘B’ 200-medley relay and had the fastest 50-fly split. It was solid top to bottom.”
The energy continued into Saturday morning’s competition with Nusbaum re-setting the tone of the meet in the 100-yard freestyle (52.35) and then Parrish, Manning and senior Madison Straight going 1-2-3 in the 200-yard backstroke to push its lead to a 35-point advantage over Iowa State.
“We went 1-2-3 in both the 100- and 200-yard backstroke, and it is a real strength of ours,” Campbell said. “I think it is important to take that extra step and show our dominance because we know it is a strength for us.”
Downey and freshman Ellie Flanagan finished first and second in the 200-yard breaststroke and the 500-yard freestyle followed with freshman Crissie Blomquist and Nusbaum also claiming gold and silver.
The Jayhawks ended the two-day dual with a first place in the 200-yard individual medley by Straight (2:07.76) and in the 400-yard freestyle Relay by Nusbaum, Bishop, Parrish and sophomore Carly Straight (3:28.60).
“It is always our goal at the end of our season to have a strong end, and every 16 years we have had a winning dual meet,” Campbell said. “We are training hard and racing a lot, and I am very pleased with how we finished up. Now we get to head to the Big 12 Conference Championship, which is the best part of the year for us.”
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