Eagles to swim for national title in 200 free relay

Eagles to swim for national title in 200 free relay

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – The second day of the NCAA Division II Swimming and Diving Championships at the Birmingham CrossPlex in Birmingham, Ala. brought with it five more events for the Carson-Newman swim team to compete in and they again put themselves in a great position heading into the finals on Thursday evening.

Starting things off was the women's 200 free relay and the quartet of Lisa Postma (Leiden, Holland), Margaret Stansberry (Knoxville, Tenn.), Elly Culp (West End, N.C.) and Mary Northcutt (Huntsville, Ala.) immediately made their mark. Their time of 1:33.37 placed them sixth and qualified them to swim in the event's "A" final with the national championship at stake.

"I was really pleased with the way we swam," said swim coach Jordan Taylor, "not just in the race overall, but our splits were really good. For Mary, that was her best split ever and our team equaled their best time from conference."

The men's 200 free relay team of Pijus MacKevicius (Kaunas, Lithuania), Sam Schechter (Knoxville, Tenn.), Jonny Goss (Heiskell, Tenn.) and Seth Hughes earned a 16th place finish with a mark of 1:21.75. They will be in the "B" final.

Stansberry also participated in the women's 200 free and placed ninth. Her time of 1:50.30 was just two one-hundredths of a second behind the eighth place finisher, putting into the night's "B" final.

The Eagles also swam in the women's and men's 400 medley relays, with the women finishing 21st and the men coming in 19th.

Live coverage of the finals will be available on ncaa.com. Once the festivities conclude, visit cneagles.com for a recap.

-CN-