Feb. 17, 2016
Results (200 medley relay) | Results (800 free relay) | Follow @MoStateSwim
CARBONDALE, Ill. - The Missouri State women's swimming and diving team sits just four points shy of the lead after the first two events on Wednesday, Feb. 17, at the 2016 Missouri Valley Conference Championship in the Dr. Edward J. Shea Natatorium.
The Bears are currently in third place after capturing 68 points in first-day action on the campus of Southern Illinois. Northern Iowa and SIU are tied at 72 points to sit atop the leaderboard. Illinois State (58), Little Rock (56) and Evansville (54) round out the first-day scores.
MSU opened the conference meet with its 200-yard 'A' medley relay taking runner-up in the event with a time of 1 minute, 42.94 seconds. The MSU squad of Loretta Stelnicki, Anna Bump, Josie Pearson and Hope Ernhart turned in a season-best time to finish behind Northern Iowa (1:42.37). SIU, Illinois State, Evansville and Little Rock rounded out the 'A' relay.
"The 200 medley relay is about pure speed, exchanges and excitement," Bears head coach Dave Collins said. "I felt like we were ready, and almost maybe we had some freshmen that were almost too ready. But, I think it was a great experience for them and I know that we'll be better as we go through the meet."
The Bears' remaining three relay squads took the top three spots in the final heat of the event, with the 'B' relay of CeCe Etter, Lauren Pavel, Emma Wall and Moriah Moore leading the way by touching the wall in 1:45.62.
The 800 freestyle relay was a back-and-forth battle between MSU and SIU. The Bears trailed the Salukis by just .18 seconds after the first two legs, but eventually finished runner-up in a season-best time of 7:20.97.
MSU's 'A' 800 free relay squad of Dora Kiss, Rebecca Amparano, Sydney Zupan and Josie Pearson missed a school record in the event by just .20 seconds. SIU's 'A' relay broke the 800 free relay conference record with a 7:16.60 finish.
"The 200 freestyle event is one that we've been trying to piece together all season," Collins said. "We probably don't have anybody that's traditionally a 200 freestyler on our team, so a majority of the people on that 800, swimming the 200 free, they're stroke swimmers for us. That's probably coming out of their comfort zone a little bit, so I thought they did a great job."
Emma Metz, Ibby Simcox, Heather Snyder and Brianna McCullough swam for MSU's 'B' relay and eventually finished with the fifth fastest time (7:20.97) among the eight teams to compete.
"We wanted to win a couple of relays tonight," Collins said. "We came into the meet with a goal of winning both the relays. We knew that it was going to be a challenge, but I'm pleased with how we raced. I think we got everybody involved on our entire team on some 'B' and 'C' relays, and I think collectively we all swam well. This is a seven-session meet, we've got a long ways to go. We're in it, we'll have to be really good throughout the weekend and I'm looking forward to it."
The 2016 MVC Championship continues with preliminaries at 11 a.m. Thursday, Feb. 18, at the Dr. Edward J. Shea Natatorium. Finals begin Thursday at approximately 6 p.m., with links to the MVC live stream available on the Missouri State swimming and diving schedule page at missouristatebears.com.
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