Amy Prugh finished 17th in the 100-yard butterfly (Photo courtesy Wabash College)
CANTON, Ohio - Several standout individual performances highlighted a strong Wittenberg finish to the second day of the 2007 North Coast Athletic Conference championships.
As a team, the Tigers held their ground in a pitched battle for third place in the women's standings. After capturing third place behind national powerhouses Kenyon and Denison for the first time ever in 2006, Wittenberg is once again in the No. 3 position, this time by a 70.5 margin over Allegheny College. The Tigers will start the third and final day of the competition with 552.5 points after a stellar, occasionally record-breaking, Day 2 in Canton.
On the men's side, the Tigers also held their own as they remained in fifth place for a second straight day, also matching last year's overall finish. Wittenberg lost some ground, however, in the battle for third place as both Wabash College and the College of Wooster put some distance between them and the Tigers. Wittenberg heads into Day 3 with 425 points, 94 behind fourth-place Wooster.
Individually, the Tigers crowned their first champion of this competition as junior Courtney Roth (Gurnee, Ill/Lake Forest) took top honors in the 1-meter diving event. Roth, the 2006 runner-up in the event en route to NCAC Diver of the Year honors, checked in with 350.40 points to capture the victory - thanks in large part to a clutch final dive that pushed her ahead of a crowded eight-person final round field. Also of note was the performance of freshman Lauren Stets (Westerville, Ohio/North), who finished fourth.
Also of note for the women was the first NCAA B Cut of freshman Adeline Brym's (Mansfield, Ohio/Lexington) budding collegiate career. She earned All-NCAC honors with a third-place finish in the 200 freestyle with a time of 1:55.89, which just narrowly earned her provisional qualification to next month's NCAA Division III National Championship meet in Houston, Texas. Brym lowered that time later in the evening with her leadoff leg of the 800-yard relay as she touched the wall in 1:55.77.
The women's 800 relay placed third, which brought All-NCAC honors to Brym, freshman Emily Roesch (Oakland, Mich./Lake Orion), freshman Janna House (St. Thomas, Ontario/Central Elgin Collegiate Institute) and junior Lindsay Smith (Mount Vernon, Ohio/Mount Vernon). In addition, the time of 7:53.27 broke a school record set at this meet a year ago, a mark that was just over one second off the national provisional qualifying standard.
On the men's side, the top individual finishers were both freshmen. Neil Anderson (Lakewood, Ohio/Lakewood) took fifth place in the 200-yard freestyle, and his time was just three-tenths of a second off the NCAA B Cut. Taylor Smith (Mansfield, Ohio/Senior) claimed sixth place in the 100-yard backstroke.
Senior Cody Nicely (Knoxville, Tenn./Bearden) once again was a contender in a diving event until the final score was tallied, this time coming in fourth place in the 3-meter competition. Freshman Matt Erenpreiss (Columbus, Ohio/Centennial) claimed seventh place in that event to give the Tigers some much-needed team points.