Swimming falls to University of Houston, New Mexico

By Tracy Dansker     11/13/08 6:00pm

Winston Churchill once said, "Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm." After being defeated by four out of the five teams they have competed against this season, this is exactly the attitude the swim team has chosen to maintain, even after falling last weekend to the University of Houston 173-121 and New Mexico State University 151-143. Head coach Seth Huston said he believes in the strength of his team across the board.

"What we have here [at Rice] is a really good conference team," Huston said. "We might not have a stud, so to speak, in every event against every team in a dual meet, but we're going to have a lot of depth, and that is really crucial when you get to a championship meet."

Rice next competes at the Phil Hansel Duals, a two-day meet starting today at 6 p.m. and tomorrow at 11:30 a.m. UH hosts the meet at the UH Recreation Center Natatorium. The teams competing include Rice, UH, University of the Incarnate Word, Vanderbilt University and Florida International University. The meet will be scored as if it is a conglomeration of four dual meets, so while all five teams will swim at the same time, each team will be scored against every other team on a head-to-head basis. Incarnate Word is currently 3-2, Vanderbilt is 1-2, Florida International is 0-4, and after beating Rice, UH is now 5-1.

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Sophomore Ashten Ackerman believes Rice will be successful against UH this time around.

"We should dominate them," Ackerman said. "It's going to come down to us and UH."

Rice began last weekend's meet in strong fashion, winning the first event, the 400-yard medley relay. The foursome of juniors Angelo Wo and Pam Zelnick, freshman Alexandra Ernst and senior Carlyann Miller took first with a season-best time of 3:56.99.

Of the 15 remaining events, UH took first place in 11 of them, and New Mexico took the other four first places. Rice, however, did secure six second place finishes. Junior Justine Lin swam a season-best in the 200-yard backstroke, finishing at 2:05.33 to take second place. Freshman Shelby Bottoms twice rose to the top of the pack, taking second place in the 200-yard freestyle with a time of 1:52.53 and then again in the 200-yard individual medley with a time of 2:09.19.

Huston felt this meet was a superb performance by the Owls.

"We swam probably one of our best meets of the season," Huston said. "New Mexico State and Houston just looked like they were more physically ready."

Junior Erin Mattson and Ernst placed second and third, respectively, in the 100-yard butterfly, while Lin and Wo took third and fourth in the 100- yard backstroke. Snatching second, third and fourth place in the 1,000- yard freestyle were distance swimmers senior Caitlin Warner and freshmen Nicole Delaloye and Alex O'Brien. Rice was able to repeat this success in the 200-yard butterfly, where freshman Louise Gliga, Mattson and Ackerman finished two, three and four, respectively. Senior Skylar Craig and Zelnick were Rice's top finishers in the 50- yard and 100-yard freestyle, respectively, where they both took third place. The Owls ended the meet with a strong second place finish in the 400-yard freestyle relay. The team consisted of Zelnick, Mattson, Miller and Craig.

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