Sophomore Catherine Buroker finished third in the 500-yard freestyle with a time of 4:45.58. Senior Kaitlin Stearns finished not far behind at seventh.
Credit: Kylie CooperWithout any individual titles, it has truly been a team effort to land the Quakers fourth place in the Ivy League.
Penn women’s swimming and diving traveled to Providence, R.I. for the Ivy League Championships this weekend and finished with a total of 949.5 points. Ahead of them were Yale (1,139.5), Harvard (1,462), and Princeton (1,569), which secured its first title since 2015. Although they didn’t win any event titles, the Red and Blue showed growth by posting numerous personal best times, resetting two program records, and coming inches away from three more.
The Quakers (3-6, 2-5 Ivy) opened with a fourth-place finish in the 200-yard medley relay, powered by the sophomore trio of Hannah Kannan, Rachel Maizes, and Monika Burzynska, who were joined by senior Emily Layne. With a time of 1:40.31, the relay team finished milliseconds away from tying the program record of 1:40:27 set in the same event a year ago.
Penn also nabbed a top-10 finish on Wednesday in the 800 freestyle relay with a time of 7:21.67, which was good enough for the eighth spot. The Quakers showcased their young talent in that event with three freshmen competing, including Lyndsey Reeve, Anna Feng, and Margot Kaczorowski, in addition to senior Mollie Westrick. Penn’s results in the first two events landed them in sixth place at the conclusion of the first day of competition.
On Thursday, sophomore Catherine Buroker picked up a third-place finish in the 500 free with a time of 4:45.58. With her continued dominance over the event, it is no surprise that she earned second team All-Ivy honors last season. Joining Buroker in the final was senior Kaitlin Stearns, who finished seventh.
In the final event of the day, the Red and Blue notched a seventh-place finish in the 200 free relay, posting a time of 1:32.99. The relay team of Westrick, Layne, Kaczorowski, and Kannan came milliseconds away from tying the program record of 1:32.36.
While the Red and Blue remained in sixth at the end of the second day of competition, the race was tight, with only six points separating them from the fourth-place Columbia team.
Friday was a day of personal bests, starting with Buroker beating the program record she set last year in the 1000 free with a time of 9:39.60 while securing second-place in the event for her efforts. Stearns also achieved a personal best in the same event and finished sixth, with sophomore Grace Giddings right behind her at seventh.
Junior Andie Myers managed a career best in the 100 fly prelims to qualify for the ‘A’ final, ultimately securing seventh place. Meanwhile, Burzynska notched a first-place finish in the ‘B’ final and came just four-hundredths of a second short from resetting the program record she set last year.
In the final event of the competition, Penn secured sixth-place finish in the 400 free relay with a team of Westrick, Kaczorowski, Kannan, and Layne. The Quakers’ performance on Saturday was enough to hang on to fourth-place, improving from last year’s fifth-place finish.
This was an impressive result for the Red and Blue, as they had lost to all Ivy foes except Dartmouth and Cornell previously in the season in conference competition.
It will be the men’s turn to take on the Ivy League Championships next week at Harvard. The first event will kick off Feb. 26 at Blodgett Pool.
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