Upcoming Event: Swimming & Diving versus Boston College on September 26, 2025 at 4 p.m. Diving / 5 p.m. Swimming
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4 p.m. Diving / 5 p.m. Swimming
Swimming & Diving
vs Boston College
Thursday, February 19
Atlanta, Ga.
All Day
Duke University
vs
Day Two at Women's ACC Championship
Blue Devils Continue Action at ACC Championship
2/19/2015 11:20:00 PM | Swimming & Diving
ATLANTA – The Duke women turned in a number of solid individual performances and earned a sixth-place finish in the 200-yard freestyle relay Thursday on the second day of competition at the 2015 ACC Women's Swimming and Diving Championship.
A trio of Blue Devils got the individual swimming events underway Thursday morning by earning spots in the 500 freestyle 'C' final. The evening session saw freshman Verity Abel touch in 4:48.47 for a season-best and the third-fastest time in program history. Placing second in the heat and 18th overall, she was joined in the 'C' final by sophomore Brittany Friese, who finished 22nd in a personal-best 4:50.58, and junior Kiera Molloy, who took 24th (4:53.31). Molloy also earned a personal-best mark in the preliminaries with a 4:51.76 swim.
Freshman Leah Goldman broke into the 200 IM 'B' final, and dropped time from her morning performance to go 1:58.60 for 11th place. Her finals clocking matched 2014 graduate Christine Wixted's school record in the event and represented an NCAA provisional cut.
Duke placed two swimmers in the 50 freestyle finals, with sophomore Maddie Rusch coming in 14th (22.76) and junior Kathryn Eckhart 22nd (22.97). Rusch's preliminary mark of 22.62 was one one-hundredth of a second off of her personal best while Eckhart's finals time was good for a personal best and third on the Blue Devils' all-time top-10 list. In addition, both swimmers surpassed the NCAA provisional standard in the sprint race.
Thursday afternoon's diving preliminaries saw three Duke divers score with their showings on the 1-meter board. Junior Kendall McClenney led the Blue Devils for the second consecutive day, placing 15th with an award of 261.45. Freshman MaryEllen Targonski also scored in 18th place (255.00), as did sophomore Kirby Quinn in 22nd (244.35).
In the final event of the evening, Goldman, Rusch, sophomore Jessie Sutherland and Eckhart tapped the wall sixth in the 200 freestyle relay at 1:30.72. That time was a season-best for the group and was also the third-fastest in program history.
The Duke women remained in 10th place in the team standings at the end of the second day with 207 total points. Virginia took over the lead with 486 points, followed by North Carolina (458) and NC State (383).
Preliminaries resume Friday, Feb. 20 at 10 a.m. at the Aquatic Center in Atlanta, while finals are set for 6 p.m. on ESPN3.
Duke Team Score: 10th/13 (207)
Top Duke Finishers by Event:
Women's 500-Yard Freestyle: Verity Abel (18th), 4:48.47
Women's 200-Yard Individual Medley: Leah Goldman (11th), 1:58.60
Women's 50-Yard Freestyle: Maddie Rusch (14th), 22.76
Women's 1-Meter Diving: Kendall McClenney (15th), 261.45
Women's 200-Yard Freestyle Relay: Leah Goldman, Maddie Rusch, Jessie Sutherland, Kathryn Eckhart (6th), 1:30.72
#GoDuke
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