CMS Women's Swim and Dive Looks to Win Back SCIAC Title This Week
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CLAREMONT, Calif. - The Claremont-Mudd-Scripps women's swimming and diving team will look to reclaim the SCIAC title this week when it competes in the four-day league championships from Wednesday-Saturday at East Los Angeles College (ELAC)
CMS will serve as the host institution for the event, which will get underway with women's three-meter diving prelims at 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, followed by the finals at 3:30 p.m. Swimming will get underway following the completion of diving at 5:45 p.m. with the 200-yard medley relay and the 800-yard freestyle relay.
On Thursday, swimming prelims will take place at 9 a.m. with the 500 free, 200 IM, and 50 free, with the women's one-meter prelims at 1 p.m., followed by the 500 free, 200 IM and 50 free finals at 5:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday will follow a similar schedule with backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly and freestyle events having prelims in the morning and finals in the evening, with the one-meter diving finals taking place on Friday at 3:45 p.m.
Pomona-Pitzer is a slight favorite to repeat, but CMS has a solid path to victory, behind its dominance in the backstroke and distance events, as well as Augusta Lewis' dominance in the individual medley events. Lewis has won all six IM championships since joining the program in 2018-19, and came back for her fifth year to make up for losing the 2020-21 season to the pandemic and try to make it eight-for-eight. She holds the league records in both IM events, is a first-team All-American in the breaststroke, and also set the league's 200-yard butterfly record last week in her final career home meet.
In the backstroke, CMS went 1-2-3 in the 200 last year and added a 1-2 in the 100. In the 200 back, Jameson Mitchum was the league champion and went on to earn first-team All-America honors, and she was followed by Sammy Ennis in second and Anna Werts in third, with Werts reaching the podium by just .02 over the fourth-place finisher in a tight finish. Ennis, meanwhile, was the winner in the 100 back, while Mitchum placed second. Based on seeds this year, CMS can expect similar results, with newcomers Quinn Katayama-Stall (seeded second in the 200 back behind Mitchum, and fifth in the 100 back) and Sun Young Byun (seeded second in the 100 back behind Mitchum) both showing podium potential.
In the distance events, CMS went 1-2 in both the 1650 and the 500 last year, with Ella Blake winning both, edging Gracey Hiebert in the 1650 (in 2020, the same two Athenas finished 1-2 in the 1650 in the opposite order with Hiebert earning the title). In the 500, the graduated Leila El Masri finished second last year (and Hiebert was fourth), but the addition of Katy Shaw, who is the top seed in the 1650 going in (as well as the No. 3 seed in the 500) portends another strong CMS showing in the distance events this year.
CMS returns several finalists from a year ago who will be looking to make their way onto the podium this season with top-three finishes. Allyson Yao was fourth in the 200 fly, fifth in the 400 IM and sixth in the 200 IM, Kelly Prawira was fifth in the 200 breast, sixth in the 100 breast, and eighth in the 200 IM, while Alex Towers was eighth in the 500. Annie Johnson studied abroad in the fall last year and has the potential to reach the podium in the 200 fly, where she is seeded fourth going in (Lewis is seeded first and it may not be one of her three individual events).
For the Athenas to make a run at Pomona-Pitzer, several promising newcomers will need to provide points in multiple events. Mackenzie Mayfield is seeded second in the 100 breast and 200 IM, and fourth in the 200 breast, and will be a key to the CMS medley relay efforts. Byun is seeded fifth in the 100 fly and ninth in the 200 fly, in addition to being second in the 100 back. Annika Sharma is seeded sixth in the 50 free and seventh in the 100 fly, Ally Rudolph is ninth in the 50 free and 11th in the 100 free, and Madeleine Kan is 10th in the 100 fly and 14th in the 100 free, and all three will be important in the sprints and relay events.
The Athenas will also be looking for a larger presence on the diving podiums this season, after Alexis Romero (one-meter) and Izzy Doud (three-meter) were third-place finishers. Makenna Parkinson swept both boards on her Senior Day last weekend to close the regular season strong, while Emma Ng Pack will also be a potential top-three finisher after just missing qualifying for nationals last year.
After competing at SCIACs, the Athenas will wait on NCAA qualifications, where they will hope to improve on their 11th-place finish from a year ago. Lewis will be trying to earn a national title after finishing second, third and fourth in her three events last year to earn All-America honors three times. Mitchum is also hoping to make it back after earning first-team All-America distinction in the 200 back last year.
