Poets top Chapman in swimming & diving

ORANGE, Calif. – The Chapman University men's and women's swimming and diving teams were swept by visiting Whittier College on Saturday in a SCIAC matchup at the Allred Aquatics Center. The Poet women defeated the Panthers by an overall score of 135-108 while their men trumped Chapman 142.5-69.5.

The Chapman women kept the scoring close in the meet with quite a few second- and third-place finishes in swim events, but only earned the top prize of nine first-place points in four events. The Panther men earned a pair of victories overall.

Two of those first-place events for the women were earned by senior diver Kiernan Gilbert who captured the women's 1-meter and 3-meter springboard competitions. Gilbert earned scores of 177.2 (1-meter) and 197.25 (3-meter) in the morning dive events to give Chapman an early points lead.

However, outside of Gilbert's wins the Chapman women garnered only two swimming victories against the Poets, first in the 200-yard medley relay and then in the 400-yard individual medley.

Chapman's medley relay team of seniors Amanda Morris (back), Sami McLaughlin (breast) and sophomores Alex Carubis (butterfly) and Kirsten Spicer (freestyle) shaved over a second off of their season-best time with a finishing mark of 1:58.34 to edge the Poets' team by a second and a half.

Carubis later claimed first in the 400 IM with a mark of 4:55.02 and was third in the 100-yard backstroke, her only other individual event of the day.

For the men, sophomore Erik Murata took first place in the 100-yard freestyle with a sprint time of 50.59, more than 2 seconds faster than his previous best this year. Freshman James Gaskin defeated a trio of Poets in the 100-yard breaststroke with a finish of 1:06.33 for the Panthers.

Both teams return to action next Saturday when they travel to Claremont to face both Claremont-Mudd-Scripps and Occidental Colleges.

by Doug Aiken
Sports Information Director

Results: http://www.chapmanathletics.com/sports/swimdive/2012-13/files/WC-CU.pdf

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