W. Swimming inaugurates a new diver but loses to Navy

The Penn women's swimming team lost by 74 points but saw many individual improvements. After Saturday's meet against Navy, Penn women's swimming coach Kathy Lawlor-Gilbert was standing around with a recruit and her parents. As they were talking, Navy coach Dick Purdy approached the recruit to tell her that she is making the right choice by coming to Penn and that the women's swimming program is as strong as it's been in four years. Considering that Navy (7-3) had just beaten the Quakers 181.5-107.5, this praise for Penn may seem out of place. But to the Quakers (2-5), their performance on Saturday cannot be measured by the 74-point margin of defeat. "We got more psyched up for this meet than we have been in a while, and that really helped us a lot," Penn freshman April Fletcher said. "It was a great meet." Lawlor-Gilbert agreed with the assertion that Saturday was a great meet, especially for Fletcher and sophomore Cathy Holland, who she named the meet's two outstanding performers. Fletcher finished first in the 200-yard individual medley with a time of 2:13.70 and took second in the 200-yard free in 1:59.89. "I was really happy with both of my swims," Fletcher said. "It was nice to get a change, because they are events I don't usually swim." Holland won the 1,000-yard free in 10:26.04. "Personally, I thought my performance was right where it should be at this point in the season," said Holland, who expects the team to log less mileage in practice this week to prepare for next weekend's meet against Yale and Dartmouth. Despite the performances of Fletcher, Holland and the rest of the swimmers, the most important event on Saturday did not come from the swimming side of the competition. "The biggest news of the meet is that our freshman diver made her debut and placed second in both events," Lawlor-Gilbert said. In her first collegiate competition, Kathie Dykes scored eight points for the Red and Blue -- four in both the one-meter and three-meter dives. This was a luxury the Quakers did not have in meets earlier this season. Two weeks ago, Penn beat Drexel despite not having any divers, forfeiting every diving point to the Dragons. Although it worked for that particular meet, an absence of divers will not do much to help a team in the Ivy League season. "You can't hand over 26 points and expect to compete," Lawlor-Gilbert said. While Dykes' diving made competing with the Midshipmen easier, the Navy swimmers were just too strong for Penn. Navy had three swimmers who won two events each and several others who picked up second and third places in various events.

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