W. Swimming sinks as Brown rolls to title

Penn's women swimming team finished eighth at the Ivy League Championships. The Ivy League women's swimming and diving championships did not feature many surprises. A former and future Olympian broke records, and the dominant team of the season pulled away to clinch its second straight league championship. Penn, too, found itself in a familiar spot -- eighth place in the Ancient Eight. Brown, which beat the Quakers 193-69 in a dual meet in January, scored points early and often at Princeton's DeNunzio Pool en route to the title. The Bears won the three-day meet's first event on Thursday, the 200-yard freestyle relay, with a time of 1:35.07, 3/10ths of a second ahead of the host Tigers. Penn finished sixth in the relay event, ahead of Cornell, which stood two points behind the Red and Blue at the end of the first day, and Harvard, which did not participate in the event. Katie Cowan was the star of the meet for Brown, winning the 200- and 500-yard freestyles. Cowan also swam the anchor leg of the Bears' 800-yard freestyle relay on Friday. The relay team from Providence, R.I., surprised the Columbia team, anchored by Christina Teuscher, who was part of the United States' gold medal-winning group in the same event at the Olympics in 1996. Teuscher, however, would not be denied personal glory at the meet, even though Columbia did finish a disappointing fifth place. The Lions junior set records all weekend long. On Thursday, in the 200-yard individual medley, Teuscher shattered her meet record and pool record time of 2:00.83, set at the Ivy meet in 1997, swimming the four-stroke event in 1:57.63. Teuscher's domination of the event was remarkable, as the next closest finisher, Bears freshman Wendy Brown, completed the event in 2:02.45. On the meet's second day, Teuscher continued to dazzle, swimming past the field in the 400-yard individual medley. Columbia's best swimmer again easily surpassed her own meet and pool record, leaving the field in her wake. In this event, Teuscher smashed her previous record of 4:12.76 by 6.02 seconds. Princeton freshman Jenny Macaulay was second with a time of 4:21.23. Penn's top swimmer in the event, sophomore Cathy Holland, placed 18th with a time of 4:35.47, failing to score any points for the Red and Blue. "Personally, I was hoping to swim faster in both the 200- and 400-[yard] IMs, but upon reflection, I think my training this year focused more on the longer freestyle events," Holland said. "I am not disappointed at all. It is extremely difficult to train and taper for both the IM and the 1,650. Those events are like night and day, and this year, I swam my lifetime best in the mile, as did Kay O'Meara, my cohort in the distance freestyle group." Teuscher, meanwhile dusted the field for a third time on Saturday, swimming the fastest 200-yard breaststroke ever swum at the pool in Old Nassau with a time of 2:14.64. The old pool record was 2:15.37, held by Princeton's Carawi Seto. Teuscher barely missed her own meet record of 2:14.27, which she set last year at Harvard, but beat the pack, led by Brown's Stephanie Hughes and Macaulay, by over four seconds. The Quakers' closest swimmer, April Fletcher, finished 17th in 2:25.40. The highlight for Penn was certainly the performance of its freshmen at their first Ivy Championships. Devin McGlynn picked up points for the Quakers in the 100- and 200-yard freestyle events, as well as several relays. Fletcher scored six points for the Quakers in the 100-yard breaststroke with an 11th-place finish; she just missed points in the 200 but won the bonus consolation heat. "Everyone should be extremely proud of themselves," Holland said. "We have emerged in the Ivy League as an up-and-coming force to be reckoned with, and we proved that by competing so fiercely this weekend." Unfortunately for Penn, this season's motion of coming up has meant rising from the lower part of the basement to the upper part. Next season, the freshman-laden squad will be joined by a fresh set of recruits and the Quakers will try to climb above the Ivy League's ground floor by posting some victories.