By Chris Judd, News Correspondent

The Northeastern swimming and diving team took advantage of its senior day celebration by beating the University of Vermont (UVM) 187.5-112.5 at Barletta Natatorium on Jan. 19.

“We expected the senior class to lead us, and they did,” head coach Roy Coates said. “It was fun, they swam well and were good leaders.”

The Huskies had six seniors who were honored at the meet. Kelley Becherer, Cassandra Cesaro, Nicole Colucci, Chelsea Lim, Keary McClernan and Allison Walker were each recognized with their parents during a ceremony in which they received flowers and a photo of themselves in the pool.

“Senior day was definitely bittersweet,” Lim said. “All the seniors put in so much work in the past four years. Sometimes it was rough, but we pulled through and we’re all really proud.”

Coates also was honored for his 20th year coaching the Huskies, and he and his veteran swimmers are all familiar with facing UVM’s team.

“Every year we swim against UVM, it’s competitive,” Lim said. “We all came in prepared, excited and motivated, and we performed really well.”

Junior Candace Young won both the three-meter dive and the one-meter dive with season-high scores. She scored 267.07 points in the three-meter dive and 251.02 in the one-meter dive. Freshman Megan Rutter took second in the three-meter dive with 221.47 points.

The Huskies earned the top two performances in the 200-meter medley relays. Junior Dana Schleif, junior Julia Alvarez, sophomore Erica DeMunbrun and Becherer took first place (1:49.11), and Colucci, sophomore Deirdre Esposito, junior Alli Gielowski and junior Julia Sepulveda took second (1:51.65).

Junior Colleen McCormack took second in the 1,000-meter freestyle with a season-high 10:38.09, as junior Jenny Doolin followed in third (10:45.57).

Sophomore Megan Foran and Becherer grabbed the top two places in the 200-meter freestyle with times of 1:55.56 and 1:56.23 respectively.

The Huskies also took the top three places in the 100-meter breaststroke. Alvarez took first (1:05.66), McClernan took second (1:07.45) and Esposito finished third (1:08.08), which was a season high.

Sophomore Anna Schegoleva won the 100-meter backstroke (58.75), the 200-meter backstroke and the 100-meter butterfly (59.08). She has won both the 100 and 200-meter backstroke in the past two meets. In the 100-meter butterfly, teammates DeMunbrun (59.67) and Gielowski (59.68) finished in second and third respectively.

In the 50-meter freestyle, Becherer finished in second (25.34), a half of a second behind the first place finish. In the 200-meter butterfly, DeMunbrun finished in second place in 2:09.12, while Gielowski finished third (2:09.94) and J. Sepulveda finished fourth (2:09.95).

McClernan and Alvarez also finished first and second in the 200-meter breaststroke. Foran won the 500-meter freestyle (5:06.15) and J. Sepulveda won the 400-meter individual medley with a time of 4:31.88.

In the 200-meter free relay, the Huskies had a second and third place finish. Foran, DeMunbrun, J. Colucci and Schegoleva finished in second with a 1:41.44, while seniors Cesaro, Colucci, Lim and Becherer took third (1:41.46).

The Huskies next hit the pool this weekend at the Dartmouth Invitational in White River Junction, Vt. for two days of competition. Teams competing will be Dartmouth College, Boston College, Boston University, Connecticut College, University of Maine and the University of Massachusetts-Amherst.

“The Dartmouth Invitational will be a really good dress rehearsal for championships,” Coates said. “It will have all the same events that will be in championships and with eight or nine different schools being there. It’s going to be great competition.”

Although the Dartmouth Invitational will be competitive, the Huskies say they are eager for the challenge.

“There are going to be some teams there that we lost to in the dual meets that we want to beat,” Lim said. “There are others that we haven’t faced this year.”

Swimming and diving teams do most of their heavy training for championships during the month of January, so the Huskies are in the thick of it.

“The training was difficult mentally and physically,” Lim said. “We knew it would be tough going into the month a little better than we did previously. Ultimately, it made us a better team.”