Augusta Lewis, Jacque Desmond Sweep SCIAC Swimmer and Diver of the Week Awards

CLAREMONT, Calif. - Freshman Augusta Lewis was named the SCIAC Women's Swimmer of the Week, and senior Jacque Desmond captured the SCIAC Women's Diver of the Week for the second straight time, the league office announced today.

Lewis and Desmond were honored for their roles in helping the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps women's swimming and diving team to a 195-158 win over Pomona-Pitzer in a two-day meet on Friday and Saturday. The No. 12-ranked Athenas were coming off a narrow 149-141 win over Occidental in its previous meet, and were facing a tough challenge in No. 14 Pomona-Pitzer, but were able to control the meet throughout on their way to improving to 4-0 in the SCIAC this season. 

Lewis earned the Swimmer of the Week honor after picking up three individual wins in the meet, all of which came in Axelrood Pool-record times. She took the 200-yard individual medley on Friday by over a four-second margin, winning in 2:06.29 to break a pool record which had stood for 15 years since it was set by Breanne Hentschke of Cal Baptist in 2003.  

On Saturday, she added two more wins, taking the 400 IM by exactly a five-second margin in 4:31.17, breaking the previous pool record of 4:32.68 set by Michelle Kee in January of 2012. She capped off her meet by winning the 200-yard breaststroke in 2:20.80, passing the Axelrood standard set last year by current junior Claire Bacon-Brenes (who is currently studying abroad). Both her 200 breast and her 200 IM times were NCAA "B" cuts, while she became the third CMS women's swimmer to win the honor this season, joining sophomore Mia Syme and freshman Ava Sealander. 

Desmond was named the Diver of the Week for the second straight time after also earning it after the Occidental meet on Nov. 17 (no awards were given out last week while nobody was active over the Thanksgiving break). Desmond came in first place in the one-meter dive with a 268.86, a 25-point margin over the second-place finisher and eclipsing her previous season high set in the Occidental meet. She then added a second-place finish in the three-meter dive behind teammate Emily Bhatt, just edging out Pomona-Pitzer Emma van der Veek by less than a point to take the silver. 

CMS will return to action again after the new year, when the distance swimmers head to Cal Baptist on Jan. 4 and the divers host Westminster on Jan. 6. The next full meet will be another SCIAC dual at Whittier, which will take place on Saturday Jan. 12.