The Brandeis men’s and women’s swim and dive teams celebrated four seniors at their Senior Day Meet, Saturday, Jan. 30 at 2 p.m. Graduating from the team are David Lazarovich ’16, Fallon Bushee ’16, Fay Laborio ’16 and Theresa Gaffney ’16, editor-in-chief of The Brandeis Hoot.
The send-off for the seniors began with flowers and photos as the teams prepared for an intense meet against Clark University.
The first event saw a Brandeis win in the 200-yard medley relay featuring co-captain Bushee in the second spot. The scores remained close through the entire meet until the women fell to Clark by only three points in a 144-147 loss.
In an intense 1,000-yard freestyle, Joanna Murphy ’17 led the Judges, taking second place behind Clark University’s Melissa Orzechowski. Co-captain Gaffney took third place for the event, adding three points to the Judges’ overall score. The action came in the race for fourth place, as Morgan Kolb ’17 stole fourth from Clark’s Amanda Brackett by only 0.04 seconds.
Bushee went on to steal two event wins for the Judges, taking first in both the 100-yard breaststroke and the 200-yard breaststroke. She also took second place in the 200-yard individual medley. Co-captain Laborio earned the Judges four points for a second place in the 200-yard breaststroke.
Other Brandeis first prize placements on the women’s side came from Sherry Tu ’18 in the 100-yard backstroke, Kylie Herman ’19 in the 200-yard butterfly and Amy Sheinhait ’18 in the 100-yard freestyle.
The loss resulted in a 4-9 record for the women’s swim team.
The men had a more successful day on Saturday, outracing Clark University to take the win with 160 points to Clark’s 132. They took first place in the first four events until a swimmer from Clark University finally snapped the streak. The meet win was their second win in a row, improving the team’s record to 2-8-1 for the season.
The meet began with the 200-yard medley relay with two teams of Brandeis swimmers facing off against two teams of Clark swimmers. The first Brandeis team took first place by a solid 1.3 seconds, while the second team, featuring Lazarovich, trailed the Clark’s second place team by 6.34 seconds.
In the men’s 1,000-yard freestyle, Zach Diamond ’18 made an impressive showing with a time of 10:18.48, stealing the win by 46.49 seconds.
The Judges performed in two events where Brandeis took first, second and third place over Clark swimmers. In the 200-yard backstroke, Edan Zitelny ’17, Taku Harada ’18 and Lazarovich outswam all the opposing swimmers. Lazarovich, who took third in the race, was 9.21 seconds ahead of the nearest Clark swimmer in the event. Also, the Judges outperformed every other competing Clark swimmer in the 200-yard individual medley. Similarly, Zitelny took first place, while Diamond and Lazarovich were close behind in second and third place, respectively. Each of these two events supplied the Judges with 16 points, only giving Clark three.
Event wins also came from Cam Braz ’17 in the 200-yard freestyle and 500-yard freestyle, Eb Weber ’17 in the 100-yard backstroke and 100-yard butterfly, Zitelny in the 200-yard butterfly and Diamond in the 100-yard freestyle.
The seniors will finish their season at the UAA Championships beginning Feb. 17 at the University of Rochester.
