By Craig Roman
It was Senior Day Saturday at the Barletta Natatorium, but the senior’s smiles quickly turned to frowns as the Northeastern swimming and diving team lost its third straight meet, this time to Columbia University, 136-107. It was the second loss to an Ivy League team.
The day signaled the final home meet for an impressive collection of seniors. The senior class of Adela Gavozdea, Kristen Kane, Kelly McIsaac, Lauren Portman, Emily Rochefort and Katie Schmalling helped bring three America East Conference championships to Northeastern during their four years at Northeastern.
Coach Roy Coates delivered an emotional pre-meet speech reminding the crowd that “these seniors were part of three conference championship teams, and 10 school records.”
When the meet did get underway it was a close contest throughout. In the 400-yard medley relay, the team of Coryn Voels, Sarah Reddick, Kane and Schmalling (4:00.27) was able to hold off Columbia, thanks to the third leg, swam by junior Reddick.
Aside from her win in the relay, senior captain Kane scored seven points for the Huskies by placing second in the 200-yard breaststroke (2:25.96).
Reddick also won the 200-yard individual medley (2:12.53), which put Northeastern ahead 50-43 after five races. She later finished a close second behind race winner, freshman Kara Lane from Northeastern in the 200-yard butterfly.
Schmalling and Kelly McIsaac finished second and fourth, respectively, in the 100-yard freestyle (54.82 and 55.82).
In her final home diving performance, Gavozdea finished second in the one-meter dive (274.43) behind Columbia’s record-setting diver Teresa Herrmann. Gavozdea also finished a distant third in the three-meter dive (243.52).
Junior Emily Crookall-Nixon came away with two wins for the Huskies by a combined 1.1 seconds. First, she was able to hold off Lauren Morford of Columbia and teammate Voels in the 200-yard freestyle (1:56.43). Later in the ninth race, the 200-yard backstroke, she was able to beat out Kelly McConnell of Columbia to give the Huskies a seven-point lead 88-81. That would prove to be the last lead the Huskies had as Columbia went on to win the 10th race, the 500-yard freestyle, and never looked back.
The six seniors went 14-3 in the American East Conference over the past four years, and compiled an overall record of 29-11.
Gavozdea is the raining school champion in the platform dive (380.60), Kane is the 200 breaststroke record holder (2:20.98) and McIsaac holds the school record in the 200 freestyle (1:53.71). Northeastern is also graduating two all-conference swimmers from last year, Rochefort and Schmalling.
The record board in Barletta is plastered with her name, as it appears in six different categories. Schmalling is the record holder in the 100 (57.71) and 200- (2:05.64) yard backstrokes, and a member of the school record-holding 200 (1:35.91) and 400 (3:29.20) freestyle relays, along with the 200 (1:46.31) and 400 (3:49.81) medley relays.
The Huskies final meet of the season is at Boston College on Feb. 3 at 6 p.m. After that, the team heads to the America East Conference Championships at the University of Maryland-Baltimore County, Feb. 18-20.
