Women’s Swimming Glides Past Simmons, 137-120
CHICOPEE, Mass. – Elms College freshman swimmer Devon DeGrazia (Westport, Mass.) clocked four individual school records and was part of a relay team that set a new pool and school record to help lift the Blazers to a 137-120 victory over Simmons College in Saturday afternoon's women's swimming dual meet at Partyka Natatorium.
With the win, Elms moves to 1-0 on the season, while Simmons slides to 1-1 overall.
The 200-meter medley relay team of DeGrazia, sophomore Tessa Dudunake (Northampton, Mass.), sophomore Emalee Furtek (Ludlow, Mass.) and sophomore Chalis Bird (Windsor, Mass.) began the meet with a pool record and school record time of 2:12.01. DeGrazia led the relay off registering a new 50-meter backstroke school record time of 32.91.
DeGrazia also notched school records in the 200-meter freestyle (2:18.47), the 100-meter freestyle (1:03.61) and the 400-meter freestyle (5:04.47).
Freshman Ashley Kirchner (Dalton, Mass.) claimed first place honors in the 800-meter freestyle clocking a new school record of 10:40.26, besting Marie Waterhouse's previous record of 10:57.13 which had stood since 2007.
Dudunake won the 50-meter breaststroke and set a new school mark with a 37.01, while Furtek added a school record performance in the 50-meter butterfly recording a time of 32.82 besting Liz Walker's previous record-holding time of 32.85 which was set in 2006.
Dudunake added first place finishes in the 50-meter freestyle and the 100-meter breaststroke with times of 29.55 and 1:23.00 respectively. Kirchner also glided to the wall first in the 100-meter butterfly in a time of 1:16.12.
Virginia Bette (Southbury, Conn.) garnered a pair of first place finishes for Simmons, winning the 50-meter and 100-meter backstroke events with times of 35.82 and 1:17.67.
Sharks' swimmer Stephanie Bitzas (Westfield, Mass.) earned top honors in the 200-meter individual medley with a speedy time of 2:59.34 just ahead of teammate Marissa Soucy (Mount Vernon. N.H.) (2:59.46).
Elms returns to action on Saturday, Nov. 23 when it travels to St. Joseph's College (Maine). Meet time is slated for 1:00 p.m.
