Arkansas, Navy vs. Penn State

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pennsylvania, January 14. ONE week after dropping a narrow decision to a nationally-ranked Princeton team, the Navy men's swimming and diving team won the final event against No. 23 Penn State to edge the Nittany Lions, 155-145, Saturday afternoon at McCoy Natatorium in University Park, Pa.

Navy (9-1) held a 142-141 lead heading into the final event of the day, the 400 freestyle relay, where 11 points go to the winning team. Penn State's (2-4) Andrew Sideras gave the Nittany Lions a slim lead (0.37) after the opening leg of the relay. However, by the time Navy's two ensuing swimmers, Zach Ingold (So., Hornell, N.Y.) and Hugh Davison (So., Towson, Md.), climbed out of the pool, the Mids held a lead of six-tenths of a second. Navy's anchor swimmer, Mac Anthony (Sr., Allentown, Pa.) expanded that advantage to eight tenths of a second after 50 yards, but his Penn State counterpart, Sean Grier, found another gear in the final half of his leg of the race. Grier bettered Anthony's time by over one-half of a second in the last 50 yards, but Anthony still managed to touch the wall in first place in an overall time of 3:00.52 to defeat Penn State's clocking of 3:00.88.

The relay victory was the third win of the day for Anthony. He also posted victories in the 200 freestyle (1:38.81) and 500 freestyle (4:32.33) events.

"Mac continues to step up in big meets," said Navy men's swimming head coach Bill Roberts. "It is fun to watch him when he is in that position."

Navy jumped out to an early lead thanks to its winning five events in a span of six races. After Anthony won the 200 free by a little more than one second over teammate Davison, Grier won the 100 backstroke for Penn State. The ensuing races saw Sean Murphy (So., Hudson, Ohio) win the 100 breaststroke (56.25) by one-quarter of a second, Mark Meyer (Sr., Bethesda, Md.) win the 200 fly (1:48.76) by three-quarters of a second and Robbie Parker (Jr., Vienna, Va.) win the 50 free (20.63) with Ingold placing second (20.90). Navy's run would be capped by Ingold winning the 100 free (45.53) by just under two tenths of a second.

Navy's additional victory on the day came in diving where Ben Freedman (So., Kennewick, Wash.) posted a score of 325.65 to win the one-meter event by 21 points.
"We knew this was going to be an intense meet," said Roberts. "There were lots of back-and-forth races and the lead seemed to always be switching hands too."

While the Navy men's team was defeating Penn State, the Navy women's team (6-4) was dropping meets to the Nittany Lions (237-63), a team that placed 35th at the 2011 NCAA Championship, and No. 20 Arkansas (232.5-67.5).

"I'm happy with the way we competed against two nationally-recognized programs," said Navy women's swimming head coach John Morrison. "The scores of the meets aside, the times we posted coming off of our tough month-long training period were competitive with what we were hoping for. We look to learn a lot from this meet and continue building upon it."

Kellie Darmody (Jr., Charlotte, N.C.) placed third overall in the 100 backstroke for the Mids. Her time of 56.92 was seven-tenths of a second in back of Penn State's Paige Whitmire and 15-hundredths behind the second-place time posted by Penn State's Amy Modglin. Darmody also would place fourth in the 200 back with her time of 2:03.07.

Also placing fourth overall in an event was Ange Sawick (Fr., Abingdon, Pa.), who did so in the 1000 free (10:10.58), Laura Gorinski (Jr., Greensburg, Pa.), who placed fourth in the 200 breaststroke (2:17.76), Toni Paruso (Jr., Savannah, Ga.), who finished in fourth place in the 100 fly (55.66), and siver Courtney Vandament (Sr., Coppell, Texas), who scored 265.50 to place fourth on the three-meter springboard.

The Navy women's team will next take to the pool for a meet on January 25 when the Mids play host to Johns Hopkins, while the men's team is off until taking part in the Navy Invitational on January 28.

The above article is a press release submitted to Swimming World Magazine. It has been posted in its entirety without editing. Swimming World offers all outlets the chance to reach our audience by contacting us at Newsmaster@swimmingworldmagazine.com. However, Swimming World reserves the right to choose what material is posted.

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