The Bobcats got their first taste of defeat this year when they lost to Ohio State 203-97.
The Buckeyes started the match by winning three straight events. Out of the 16 events of the day, Ohio State won 14.
Ohio sophomore Rachel Stearns won the 100-yard backstroke, and freshman Tori Bagan won the 100-yard breaststroke directly after. Two freshmen, Bagan and Haleigh Bartlett, entered the record book again with Bagan earning the fourth-best time in the 100-yard breaststroke and Bartlett finishing fourth in Ohio’s 1-meter diving record book with a score of 278.55.
“Ohio State showed why they’re ranked 13th in the country. They are a very good, talented, well-balanced team and certainly showed that today,” Ohio coach Greg Werner said.
He said that the Bobcats schedule non-conference meets on purpose to help evaluate their program relative to an Ohio State-caliber team and to show what it takes to compete with ranked squads.
Ohio State junior Shannon Draves, who was recruited by Ohio, won three events for the Buckeyes.
Werner said he needs to do a better job of balancing the team’s workload throughout the week because he heard complaints of tiredness.
“There’s going to come a time where we are working even harder than we are now, and that will come very, very quickly, but I also think their bodies will be better prepared for that stress than they are right now,” Werner said.
Despite the loss, Werner is pleased with the results so far in the season.
“I’m happy that we’ve had some great results, but we still have a lot of areas we can improve upon and a lot of great opportunities ahead of us,” Werner said.
Ohio has its next meet Dec. 2 when it travels to Akron for the Zippy Invitational, which the team has won five straight years.
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