Worcester, MA --- Clark's Eileen Garcia (Windham, NH) scored above the NCAA Division III qualifying standards in the one and three-meter dive as Clark downed WPI 138-105 in a women's swimming and diving meet on Thursday night. With the win the Cougars move to 3-3, while the Engineers are now 4-4.
Garcia and WPI's Marissa Goerke (San Diego, CA) each turned in NCAA qualifying dives on the one-meter board as they posted scores of 312.00 and 256.87, respectively. Garcia amassed 325.18 points to win the three-meter dive.
Goerke needs to score 255 or better in the one-meter dive at Bridgewater or the NEWMAC Championships for consideration in the NCAA Championship selections.
The 200-yard medley relay team of Heather Peruffo (Poughkeepsie, NY), Amanda Blom (Wilkes-Barre, PA), Samantha Sargalski (Windsor, CT) and Alexandra Sanz-Guerrero (Ann Arbor, MI) started off the swimming portion of the night with a win as they posted a 1:57.99.
Elizabeth Rosen (North Attleboro, MA) touched the wall first for the Cougars in the 1,000-yard freestyle (10:48.69), followed by Lauren Smith (South Pasadena, CA) (12:07.62) and Sarah Petrini (Bellevue, WA) (12:15.49). The first Engineer to finish was Kelin Song (Providence, RI) in fourth (12.19.20).
In the 200-yard freestyle Sonja Kent (West Boylston, MA) won with a time of 2:03.40 as Erin Smith (Carrollton, TX) of Clark followed .42 seconds later.
Gabriel Jijon-Nemalceff (Quito, Ecuador) was first in the 50-yard freestyle with a time of 26.03. The trio of Alana Aubin (Taunton, MA), Jess Shelsky (Nashua, NH) and Kaitlyn Kelley (Salt Lake City, UT) grabbed the next three spots with times of 27.08, 27.79 and 28.14, respectively. Kent notched her second win of the evening for the Crimson and Gray as she bested all swimmers in the 200-yard IM with a time of 2:19.36.
Erin Smith followed up her second place finish in the 200-yard freestyle with a win in the 100-yard butterfly as she posted a time of 1:03.96.
The 100-yard freestyle saw Jijon-Nemalceff win with a time of 55.72 to sweep both freestyle sprint events.
Mollie Kleyboecker (Albuquerque, NM) won the 100-yard backstroke for the Cougars in a time of 1:05.04. Rosen won her second distance race of the night as she took the 500-yard freestyle (5:19.37), as Kent placed second (5:27.99).
Morgan King (Arlington, MA) took 44.78 to win the 100-yard breaststroke, while the team of Kleyboecker, Erin Smith, Jijon-Nemalceff and Rosen won the 400-yard freestyle relay in a time of 3:52.84.
Prior to the swimming portion of the program, WPI and Clark held senior night festivities with 10 student-athletes being honored for their contributions to their respective program.
Clark Head Coach Paul Phillips honored Jen Aballo (Windham, NH), Annie Gieseker (Los Angeles, CA), Tracy Lindboe (East Brunswick, NJ), Liz Roden (North Attleboro, MA), Emily Rouleau (Bristol, CT), Lauren Smith and Britney Wigley (Newport Beach, CA).
WPI's seniors, honored by Head Coach Paul Bennett, were Lauren Anderson (Bedford, MA), Blom and Kelsey Thomas (Webster, NY).
Both teams wrap up the regular season this weekend, when the Engineers head out to Bridgewater State for a dual meet Saturday at 2pm and Clark ventures to Norton on Friday and Saturday for the Wheaton Invitational.
