Seven athletes will represent No. 19 Duke at the four-day NCAA championships at Georgia Tech’s McAuley Aquatic Center in Atlanta starting Wednesday, looking to improve on the squad’s 2015 showing in which the Blue Devils could not put a point on the board.
The Blue Devil women’s historic season came to a close Saturday when seven swimmers gave their encore postseason performances on the national stage.
In 2015, the Duke men and women sent a combined seven swimmers to the NCAA championships. This year that number has doubled as seven women are set to compete on the national stage.
Freshman Evan Moretti punched his ticket to the NCAA championships with a 10th-place finish on the three-meter board at the Zone B Diving championships in Atlanta March 7-9, rounding out the squad’s five-man roster for Atlanta March 23-26.
A year after falling one place short of competing on the national stage, sophomore MaryEllen Targonski will climb back up on the platform Wednesday looking to secure Duke’s first NCAA championship berth for a female diver since Abby Johnston in 2011.
Sophomores Leah Goldman and Isa Paez and junior Maddie Rusch earned invitations to the 2016 NCAA championships in Atlanta March 17-19 based on their season-best times in their signature events.
Entering the meet seeded third and just 0.32 off of the A standard time, the quartet of Kaz Takabayashi, Peter Kropp, David Armstrong and James Peek earned their second automatic qualification to the NCAA championships in as many years with a new program-best swim of 1:25.00.
The Blue Devils’ season has featured a number of program firsts, and the final CSCAA poll added yet another.
The Blue Devils battled for fifth in the team standings with Virginia Tech, holding on through the second and third days of the conference championships but could not withstand the Hokie’s battery of A-final swims on the last day.
Duke will head to Greensboro, N.C., for the four-day ACC championships starting Wednesday, looking for their first top-five finish since 1981—when only six teams competed.
Ashleigh Shanley held onto the wall, tears streaming down her face. She had managed to finish the race, but the pain was unbearable.
Duke wrapped up the three-day Carolina College Invitational Sunday, with senior Kathryn Eckhart stealing the show on the women’s side by sweeping the 50- and 100-yard freestyle sprints.
The Blue Devils ended the regular season with a close dual against their Tobacco Road rivals Jan. 30, and a select group of swimmers will face the Tar Heels again less than a week later.
After years of uncompetitive, one-sided dual meets, the Blue Devils finally gave the Tar Heels a run for their money, coming up short but resetting several pool records on Senior Day Saturday.
In November, the Blue Devils made program history at the Tar Heels’ Koury Natatorium by earning the Nike Cup Invitational team title on the men’s side and nearly upsetting the host squad on the women’s side. But North Carolina will look to even the score and spoil Duke’s Senior Day Saturday in the final dual meet of the season for both squads.
The Blue Devils entered Saturday’s quad meet undefeated but were unable to defend their perfect record against a pair of ranked Big Ten opponents.
After an upset win at South Carolina, the Blue Devils' dual meet schedule only gets tougher as Duke prepares for its first quad meet since 2012 featuring two ranked opponents Saturday.
The No. 22 Duke men edged No.19 South Carolina 154-146 Friday at the Carolina Natatorium with the sixth lead change of the evening. On the women’s side, Duke cruised to a 187-113 victory.
With the holidays and its annual winter training trip to Islamorada, Fla., in the rearview, Duke will kick off its 2016 schedule Friday with its first of three consecutive meets against ranked opponents.
Abby Johnston and Laura Ryan climbed up to the boards needing 63.58 points for the lead—so the 2013 Duke graduate and her partner performed a forward two-and-a-half somersault with a full twist and earned 72 points.
