Women's Swimming & Diving wins four events at Calvin (Mich.) Invitational

By Tim Glon

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — The Ohio Northern women's swimming & diving team won four events at the Calvin (Mich.) Invitational Friday and Saturday at the Venema Aquatic Center.

Sophomore Lauren Halle (Chandler, Ariz./Hamilton) and freshman Marissa Taylor (Granite Falls, N.C./South Caldwell) swept the 200 and 400 I.M. races to lead the Polar Bears.

Halle won the 400 I.M. in 4:48.74 with Taylor right behind in second place in 4:53.40.

The pair switched place for a 1-2 finish in the 200 I.M. with Taylor winning in 2:15.21 and Halle second in 2:15.65.

Halle also won the 200 fly in 2:15.55.

Senior Sydney Veon (Riverside, Ill./Riverside-Brookfield) also won an event, touching first in the 100 breast in 1:07.06.

Freshman Kelly Grimes (Cincinnati/Anderson) was fifth in the 200 fly in 2:25.28.

Sophomore Katey Stuart (Ada) posted a pair of seventh place finishes in the 100 breast (1:13.73) and the 200 breast (2:40.46).

Junior Kierra Watson (Brownsburg, Ind.) was sixth in the 200 back in 2:17.00, was seventh in the 200 I.M. in 2:20.42 and was eighth in the 100 back in 1:03.54.

The Polar Bears finished fourth in the four-team meet with 527 points.

No. 22-ranked Calvin (Mich.) won the team title with 1155 points, Albion (Mich.) was second with 861 points and Carthage (Wis.) was third with 860 points.

"This meet has virtually given us more feedback to gauge the pulse of our team on than any other meet could provide at this time of the season," ONU head coach Peggy Ewald said. "This is our first real meet opportunity of the season, with a championship format, in a fabulous championship facility in a 24 hour period of time. I'm pleased to have all this data to build off of as we move into regular season dual meets."

"We have such a young team spreading seeds for future development. We may not be winning in points or numbers of athletes against these teams but we are winning in ways of foundational strength that will show later in the season. We have much work to do but it's fun watching the team learn to keep the expectation bar high."

Ohio Northern will return to action on Friday with a 6 pm meet at Wilmington in the 2017-18 Ohio Athletic Conference opener.