Aquawomen Stun B.U., Fall to Lady Rainbows

Strong individual performances sparked the Harvard women's swimming team to a well-earned split against Boston University and the University of Hawaii in a Friday afternoon dual meet at Blodgett Pool.

The Crimson defeated B.U. for the first time in five years, 79-61, while the squad fell just short of beating Hawaii, 76-62. The split leaves Harvard 6-1 going into exams.

In the other contest, Hawaii also defeated the Lady Terriers by an identical 76-62 margin.

Harvard Coach Maura Costin offered no excuses for her team's first loss of the year, nor did she search for any.

"I think that the Hawaii loss overshadowed a great win for us over B.U.," Costin said. "To come as close as we did to a nationally-ranked team like Hawaii is a tribute to the strong job that our girls have done this season."

Harvard had a chance to tie the Lady Rainbows in the final event, the 400-yard freestyle relay, but the team's upset hopes were dashed with a third-place finish in the race.

Highlighting the afternoon for the Crimson was the performance of freshman Karen Schneider, who set a new school record of 2:06.14 seconds on the 200 butterfly. Schneider also finished third in the 100 fly and fourth in the 200 individual medley, besides swimming the butterfly leg of the 200 medley relay.

Janice Sweetser also had a strong meet, despite having to swim four tough events. Sweetser won the 200 freestyle and finished third in both the 100 and 500 freestyle events, in addition to leading off the 400 free relay.

Harvard divers had an excellent meet as well, placing first and second in both events. Jennifer Greene won the one-meter diving, while Lisa Pierce earned a personal best 261.3 points en route to a victory on the three-meter board.

The Crimson showing might have been even stronger, were it not for the absence of six team members, who were sidelined by illness and exams. Most notably absent was yardling standout Lani Nelson, who was briefly hospitalized early last week due to dehydration and remained too weak to swim.

Harvard now gets a three-week respite, which ends on February 4 when the team travels to New Haven to take on Yale.

The Yale meet marks the start of an eighteen-day stretch in which the squad swims Princeton, Cornell, Pennsylvania as well as Yale.