The Middlebury swimming and diving teams hosted the two-day Middlebury Invitational on Friday and Saturday inside the natatorium. The event featured no team scores as Williams, Springfield, Tufts and the University of Vermont took part in the meet, along with the Panthers. Middlebury will have a couple weeks off from competition before hitting the pool for the NESCAC Championships. The women's meet will take place February 16-18 at Williams, while the men's championship is February 23-25 at Bowdoin.
During the women's competition, the Panthers had very solid finishes in three relays. The 800-yard freestyle relay team of Frances VanderMeer, Georgia Houde, Angela Riggins and Stephanie Andrews won with a time of 7:57.06, while the 400-yard medley relay quartet of VanderMeer, Kristin Karpowicz, Maya Gomez and Sarah McEachern was second with a time of 4:04.76. The 200-yard medley relay quartet of Sarah Bartholomae, Gomez, Kelly Delane and McEachern finished in fifth place (1:53.09)
Individually, Andrews and Gomez both claimed event wins. Andrews led the field to the wall in the 50 free (24.46), while Gomez won the 100 breaststroke (1:05.83).
Other top-five finishes came from Karpowicz with a runner-up effort in the 200 back (2:09.35), while Allison Martin was third in the 100 back (1:02.43) and Kathryn Bullen was also third in the 400 individual medley (4:51.38). Jessica Lipton finished fourth in the 1,000 free (10:51.58), while Erin Kelly was fifth during the 100 free (54.52).
On the diving boards, Elissa DeNunzio finished second in the 1-meter (419.70 points) and third in the 3-meter (397.55 points) events, respectively.
Leading the Panther men was Connor McCormick, who won the 100 breaststroke with a time of 59.43. Jacob Fleisher was third (1:00.88) in the same event, while Charles Quinn was fifth (1:02.26).
Additional top-five finishes came from Fleisher with a third-place effort in the 200 breaststroke (2:12.65), while Adam Druckman was fourth in the 100 back (55.93).
In the diving events, Mike Chirico claimed a runner-up showing on the 3-meter board with 446.85 points.
