FULL RESULTS
LORETTO, Pa. (Jan. 29, 2011) – The Saint Francis University swimming team tied the program record for wins in a season by notching its 10th – a 140-114 victory over Siena – on Saturday afternoon at the Stokes Natatorium.
With less than three weeks to go until the Northeast Conference Championships, the Red Flash will get one more tune up next week when La Salle pays a visit to Loretto for Senior Day.
“This is a difficult time of the season; everyone wants to look ahead to conference championships,” said SFU head coach Patrick Gallagher. “We challenged this team to focus on the race in front of them and, right from the medley relays, they did exactly that.”
Flash swimmers won the first five events of the meet, beginning with the 400-yard medley relay. The winning entry of Jessica Dunn (Bristow, Va./Seton School), Elise Löfgren (Molnlycke, Sweden/Hulebacks), Libby Francis (Dundee, Scotland/Grove Academy) and Melissa Heintz (Boyertown, Pa./Oley Valley) swam a program top-10 and pool record time of 4:00.33.
Kathleen Lyon (King George, Va./King George) followed that up with an easy victory in the 1,650-yard freestyle 17:53.64. Flash swimmers swept the top three places in the event.
Jennifer Demjanenko (New Albany, Ohio/Gahanna-Lincoln) kept the streak alive in the 200-yard free style, narrowly beating out Heintz with a time of 1:56.77. Heintz registered a 1:56.86, just shy of her personal record set last season.
Competing in her second-to-last home meet, senior Hanna Yttring (Gothenburg, Sweden/Katrinelundsgymnasiet) won the first of two events in the 100-yard backstroke. Her time of 59:15 bested her previous career mark and ranks third all-time in Red Flash annals.
Yttring also won the 100 free with a swim of 53:76.
The meet's next event – the 100-yard breaststroke – also went to the Flash as Löfgren compiled a time of 1:08.68.
“I'm proud of the way this team competed this afternoon,” said Gallagher. “We had a difficult loss to this team last year and we knew they would compete hard today. We did what home teams need to do: jump on the visiting team early and don't let go.”
Down the stretch, Dunn furnished a win in the 200 backstroke with a swim of 2:09.50 and Demjanenko notched the final Red Flash first-place finish of the day in the 500 freestyle (5:15.44).
Saturday's regular season finale will get underway at 1 p.m.
