Pac-12 Weekly Swim Recap: Ledecky, Manuel Shine in Stanford Opener

Stanford's Simone Manuel. Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick

By Dan D’Addona.

A sellout crowd greeted the Stanford women’s swim team when it traveled to Oregon State.

Swimming fans wanted to see Katie Ledecky’s first collegiate meet and the Cardinal defeated the Beavers 141-109.

The first event of the season was the 200-yard medley relay and Janet Hu teamed with three new faces from last year.

Allie Szekely swam the second leg, followed by Simone Manuel, who returned after a year training for the Olympics, where she won two gold medals in Rio, followed by Ledecky’s anchor leg. The relay finished in 1:42.92.

It marked the first collegiate race for Szekely and Ledecky, who also earned their first individual wins of their careers in the 200-yard backstroke (1:57.41) and 100-yard freestyle (50.10), respectively.

They weren’t the only freshman contributors.

Stanford’s freshmen posted four wins as Megan Byrnes and Katie Drabot their first victories. Byrnes touched the wall first in the 1,000-yard freestyle at 9:58.25, and Drabot stopped the clock at 1:47.95 to edge teammate Ella Eastin in the 200-yard freestyle.

Sophomore Kim Williams won both breaststroke events, winning the 100 and 200 in 1:03.57 and 2:17.09, respectively.

It wasn’t just the underclassmen. Ally Howe won the 100-yard backstroke in 52.85, Lindsey Engel won the 50-yard freestyle and Hu won the 200-yard butterfly (1:57.96). Manuel swam in the 100-yard butterfly and finished with the top time of 54.47, and Howe also bested the field in the 200-yard individual medley (2:02.24).

Oregon State senior Czasarina Isleta finished in second in the 100-yard breaststroke with a touch of 1:05.44, nearly tying her season best by one-hundredth of a second.

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Bill Bell

7 years ago

And in another year Stanford’ll have Brooke Forde and Hanna Kukuruga plus another hotshot fresh woman PLUS Hosszu AND Sarah Sjostrom (!!!)…well maybe not last two but you get the idea.
Anyway there ought to be a law.