The Sun Devils attempted to put their strongly-swam loss against Stanford behind them Saturday to focus on sending their seniors off with a win but lagged behind their Pac-12 opponent from the start.
No. 2 California put down any hope of an ASU upset early in the meet by keeping the Sun Devils from placing first in any of the first eight events. The men were kept out of the top three in the 100-yard breaststroke, and the women were kept out of the top three in the 200-yard butterfly.
Ultimately, the men took a beating from the Bears, losing the meet by a score of 160-130.
Cal seniors Long Gutierrez and Ryan Murphy showed off their dominance by combining for 30 points in individual events. Murphy also broke the Mona Plummer Aquatic Center record in the 200-yard backstroke (1:41.22).
Though ASU had some fire power of their own in freshman Benjamin Olszewski who was neck-and-neck with Cal’s Ryan Kao in the 500-yard freestyle, the Sun Devil ended up placing second (4:29.22).
“Those are races I’d like to win, but I mean, it’s good to just go out there and race,” Olszewski said.
Olszewski also took second in the 1,000-yard freestyle (9:20.81), but his performance was not enough to make up for the men’s slow start.
Head coach Bob Bowman said that there was not a clear standout on the men’s side, but today’s meet gave him a good idea of how they match up with other Pac-12 powerhouses.
“I’m not satisfied with today, I thought we started out really lackluster,” Bowman said. “I think we need to be more resilient.”
The women lost by a larger margin with a score of 181-111, but they performed at a higher level than the men.
Senior Kat Simonovic took advantage of her final home competition, placing second in the 500-yard freestyle (4:56.38) and third in the 200-yard freestyle (1:51.66).
“You know it’s not the end, but it’s the last dual meet — it’s the last home experience,” Simonovic said. “For someone who was born and raised in Arizona, I started swimming at this pool when I was eight years old. My first lap was in lane eight.”
ASU women's 50-yard freestyle race pic.twitter.com/zxjxlTg9PA
— Anthony Totri (@Anthony_Totri) January 21, 2017
Even with a strong showing from the 2016 Rio Olympian, it was sophomore standout Marlies Ross who shinned on senior day.
Ross put up the most points (15) of any swimmer on the women’s team and did so in three individual events. But at the end of the day, her 15 points were not enough to make a difference as the women’s team fell to the Bears.
The Sun Devils will have a couple of weeks to regroup before they travel to Tucson on Feb. 4 to take on the rival Wildcats.
Reach the reporter at atotri@asu.edu or follow @Anthony_Totri on Twitter.
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