Leopards dive into season at CSN
Campus Times
November 13, 1998
The men's and women's swim team held an unusual practice at 6:30 a.m.
at Las Flores Park on Monday. "The team practices eight times a week
between 5 p.m. and 8 p.m.," said swim coach John Hallman. Team swimmer
Jessica Morgan responds to Hallman's question about her progress in a kick
board workout. The season began with an Intramural Squad/Alumni Meet last
Saturday. The teams will compete at the Pomona-Pitzer Invitational this
weekend.
by Greg MacDonald
Sports Editor
and
Mike Naya
For the Campus Times
The smell of chlorine in the air. The sun glistening off the new pool.
The sweetness of setting records. It almost makes one want to get their
feet wet. These are all of what the University La Verne men's and women's
swimming and diving teams experienced in last Saturday's meet at Cal State
Northridge.
The final experience the Leopards had was losing, as their men's team
lost, 153-34, and their women's team fell, 186-54.
"I anticipated this because they're a [NCAA] Division I team where
we're a Division III, and we're just starting out," said ULV head coach
John Hallman. "Overall, I think we did pretty good."
To add to the historical event, Hallman is an alumnus of Northridge,
where he swam from 1985 to 1987. Also, Northridge Assistant Coach Barry
Schrifels competed with Hallman for the position as the La Verne swimming
and diving head coach.
Even though it won only a single event, La Verne set 26 school records
because the meet against CSN was the first in school history for both the
swimming and diving teams.
"Northridge is a good team and everyone expected a slaughter, but
we actually hung in there," said Chris Heinrich, a ULV freshman from
Glendora. "Besides, it's all about having fun. We'll see how we do
against Pomona-Pitzer next Saturday."
"We have to focus on the battles instead of the war," said
Hallman during a speech prior to the meet, "and have some fun."
The only event won by La Verne was the women's 50-meter freestyle, in
which Tandis Morgan, a ULV freshman from El Segundo, holds the record at
25.91 seconds.
"It felt really good to hit the wall and look up and know that
I got first place in the history of the ULV swim team," said Morgan.
On the men's side, freshman John Chon finished second in the 50 freestyle
with a time of 23.15 seconds. Chon nearly finished second in the 100 freestyle,
as he hit the wall six-tenths of a second behind the second place finisher
at 51.97. Freshman Ryan MacDonald swam third in the 200-meter individual
medley in 2:09.65. MacDonald finished three seconds behind the winner of
the 100-meter breast in 1:04.57.
Aside from Morgan's winning time in the 50 freestyle, the rest of the
women's team also swam sharp. Freshman Vickie Creekmur swam third in the
100 fly and finished with a time of 1:05.91. The women's 200 medley relay
team of Morgan, Creekmur, freshmen Robin Hart and Katie Aimone were six
seconds off the pace in third at 2:00.91.
The swimmers dive into the pool for competition tomorrow at the Pomona-Pitzer
Invitational at 9 a.m. The first home meet for the Leopards is Saturday,
Dec. 5, against Whittier and Biola at 11 a.m.
