Nov. 22, 2011

ST. LOUIS, Mo. -- For the second time this season, Missouri State swimmer Melissa Oishi has been named Missouri Valley Conference Swimmer of the Week, the league announced Tuesday. It also marks the fourth straight week that a Bear has taken home the weekly award.

This weekend, Missouri State traveled to the TYR Invitational in Evanston, Ill., where it competed against BCS-conference schools including host Northwestern, Illinois, Nebraska and Iowa State. The Bears posted several lifetime best performances and finished sixth out of the eight-team field.

Junior Melissa Oishi made the championship final heat in three of her four individual events, while setting two new Missouri State varsity records along the way.

In the 200 IM, she placed 5th out of 61 competitors and moved into second place in the MVC. On Saturday, the Seattle, Wash. native grabbed another fifth-place finish in the 100 breast and narrowly broke teammate Renata Sander's varsity record set in 2011.

Oishi saved the best for last, dropping three seconds in the finals session and bringing home third place in the 200 breast (2:16.29). This time, the junior shattered Sander's MSU record in the 200 breast by over two seconds and was just .09 seconds off of the NCAA "B" qualifying cut.

Her marks in the 100 and 200 lead the conference and the 200 time ranks in the top-50 nationally.