The first swimmer to touch the wall in all but one race Saturday was representing Ohio. In all, nine different Bobcats won events.
Winning 13 of the 14 swimming events gave Ohio a comfortable 202-96 win at Youngstown State in both teams’ first meet of the season.
It was similar from last year, as Corrin Van Lanen and Emily Zimcosky lead the team with two individual wins each. They were both also on winning relays.
Van Lanen won the 100-yard freestyle — with a time .01 seconds off last year’s time against Youngstown State — and the 100-yard butterfly with a time that would have been sixth-best time last year for Ohio swimmers in the race.
Zimcosky picked up the win in the shortest event of the day, the 50-yard freestyle, for the second time in her career. She also won her fifth career race in the 200-yard freestyle.
Both relays began with either Van Lanen or Zimcosky swimming the first leg and the other one swimming the final leg to confirm Ohio victories in both the 200-yard medley relay and the 400-yard freestyle relay.
Two freshmen picked up their first wins as Bobcats. Hannah Schlegel won the 1,000-yard freestyle in a time that would have been sixth-best last year for the season. She was also part of the winning 400-yard freestyle relay. The top eight times for the 200-yard backstroke last year graduated, but Sam Glass showed the potential she has with a win in the event, outpacing the field by two seconds. Glass was also part of the medley relay team that won.
This first meet of the year sets the times for everyone to improve on throughout the season and shows the development the returners have made since last season.
Ohio will be on the road for the second straight meet as it heads to Muncie, Indiana, on Saturday to take on Mid-American Conference foe Ball State.
