Men, Women Pull Out First Win

FORT WORTH -- Both the men’s (1-0) and the women’s (1-0) swim teams started off the season winning their first dual meet against TCU Thursday with the men pulling out the win in the last event (153-147) and the women dominating through the whole meet (182-118).

“It was a tough meet,” BYU head coach Tim Powers said. “We swam well and they swam well. TCU was fired up, but we ended up with a win and we’ll take it.”

The Cougars arrived in Fort Worth only hours before the meet began, but had many good swims on the night.

The women won 14 out of 16 events, with sophomore Rachel Grant leading the way. Grant not only won the 200 fly (2:01.30), 100 fly (56.22) and 200 IM (2:05.67), but she also helped the 400 medley relay team win with a time of 3:52.37. Also on the winning 400 medley relay team was freshman Candice Smith, sophomore Aleesha Miller and senior Leilani Roberts.

Junior All-American diver Tawni Jones came out with two wins on both the 1-meter (278.85) and 3-meter (297.90) boards.

Other wins from the women came from freshman Amy Xu in the 1000 free (10:20.02), junior Natasha Menezes in the 200 free (1:50.30), Smith in the 100 back (57.73), Miller in the 50 free (23.79), Roberts in the 100 free (51.74), Smith in the 200 back (2:03.49), N. Menezes in the 500 free (4:55.92) and the 400 free relay team of Menezes, Roberts, Xu and Miller (3:27.44).

On the men’s side, the 200 medley relay team of senior Jacoby Jacobsen, junior David Mason, sophomore Vytenis Slenys and senior Gregor Greiner started out the meet winning the first event with a time of 1:34.63.

Double winners for the men included sophomore John Kendrick in the 1000 free (9:45.73) and 500 free (4:45.63) and junior Dougie Broadbent in the 200 fly (1:55.14) and 100 fly (51.91).

Adding more wins to the men’s score was senior Kenneth Clark in the 200 free (1:44.77), Jacobsen in the 100 back (51.79) and Slenys in the 100 breast (58.32).

“Competition brings out the things that we’re doing well and the things in which we need to improve,” said Powers. “Now we know where we are and we can make the necessary changes.”

The Cougar women will be back in the pool this Saturday to face New Mexico and Northern Arizona University in Albuquerque, N.M. at 11 a.m. MT, followed by the Lincoln Shootout for both the men and the women on Nov. 8-9 in Long Beach, Calif.