W. Swimming Comes Up Just Short

The dynasty hasn’t been dethroned—yet.

But that doesn’t mean the Princeton women’s swimming and diving team didn’t hear its Harvard counterpart banging on the door in advance of a changing of the guard.

Despite winning just two individual titles at the Ivy Championships, the Crimson, down just 89.5 points headed into the penultimate event thanks to a host of top-eight showings, stood on the cusp of denying the Tigers their fifth straight title. With three divers in the three-meter dive finals—and none for Princeton—Harvard needed a clean first-through-third sweep to pull within two points and make leapfrogging the Tigers in the final relay a realistic possibility.

But junior Anne Osmun, freshman Annika Griesbrecht—the one-meter champion—and tri-captain Renee Paradise fell just short of that lofty aspiration, capturing fourth through sixth, and leaving the Crimson down 14.5 points entering the 400-yard freestyle relay. Princeton’s four edged Harvard’s for third place, ending any hopes of a dramatic turn of events and sealing the title.

“We only had two individual champions and no relay wins, and we were still only down by 16.5 points,” said Crimson coach Stephanie Wriede-Morawski ’92. “All year long we have been emphasizing that it takes the full team to be successful...The reason we were so close to Princeton was because of the depth on the team.”

That depth has been steadily increasing over the past four years thanks to Wriede-Morawski’s deft recruiting, an improvement directly reflected by Harvard’s steady climb in the results at the year-end championships—fourth in 2001, third in 2002 and second in both 2003 and 2004, though the loss was narrower this season.

The crowning jewel in that enterprise has been the class of 2007, the first in program history with 100 percent matriculation among those accepted to the College.

“To have everyone who was accepted come to Harvard was wonderful, but it’s not typical,” Wriede-Morawski said.

The 10 freshmen dazzled in their first collegiate seasons, headlined by LeeAnn Chang’s breakout performances in the breaststroke and individual medley events, Giesbrecht on the boards and Emily Wilson in freestyle—all second team All-Ivy members.

“It’s a really strong class,” tri-captain Abbie Davies said. “In the past—especially in my freshman year—we had a lot of holes in our lineup. For example, we just didn’t have that many distance swimmers. Just here and there, there wasn’t the depth we needed. Now, we can look at the team and safely say that we don’t really have a weakness.”

That didn’t ensure there weren’t a few hiccups along the way. The Crimson coasted past its first three opponents, including traditional Ivy power Brown, quieting doubters who may have thought last season’s second-place run was a fluke.

But then came Harvard’s December trip to New York for a date with Columbia and Penn, during which the Crimson endured one of its greatest challenges of the season.

No, the Lions and Quakers didn’t prove difficult to handle—Harvard easily beat both despite Penn’s tapering and employment of fast suits—but the weather did. With heavy snow blanketing the highway as the team attempted to make its way southbound the evening before the meet, the bus was forced off the road and the swimmers found themselves in a Connecticut hotel with little way of preparing.

“We had planned to get to the pool around five and have a warm-up then,” Wilson said. “The hotel pool was about 12 yards long and we could fit about maybe eight people in it. We could take three strokes before a flip turn.”

But incoming captain Emily Stapleton spearheaded a composed Crimson effort, taking both backstroke events.

The stroke was a particularly strong one for Harvard, with sophomore Michelle Bright—Harvard’s lone swimming representative on the first-team All-Ivy for her win in the 200-yard backstroke—and incoming captain Molly Brethauer providing depth unmatched in the Ancient Eight.

Complementing the backstrokers, senior Kate Nadeau earned second-team All-Ivy honors for her performance in the 200-yard butterfly, while sophomores Molly Ward and Jane Evans followed up their strong debut seasons with consistent showings in short-distance freestyle, and butterfly and individual medley, respectively, to nab second-team nods. Joining them among the All-Ivy ranks was Alli Bates, who returned from injury to take second in the 100-yard butterfly at the Ivy Championships.

Both Princeton and Harvard graduate one All-Ivy member, setting up a bona fide rematch next season, when the Crimson attempts to win its first league title since 1992.

—Staff writer Timothy J. McGinn can be reached at mcginn@fas.harvard.edu.