Blue-white scrimmage starts another promising season for UK Swim & Dive

Swimming and Diving on Friday, September 30, 2016 in Lexington, Ky. Photo by Hunter Mitchell | Staff

Chris Leach

The energy in the air was electric as fans got to see the UK men and women’s swim & dive team start their season with the annual blue-white scrimmage at the Lancaster Aquatic Center Friday afternoon. 

The white team, which consisted of Danielle Galyer, reigning national champion in the 200 backstroke, ended up defeating the blue team 299-292.

Head coach Lars Jorgensen was pleased with how both teams did in the scrimmage.

“It was fun to get the season started,” Jorgensen said. “I think we’re a little better then we were last year, it’s really kind of early in our season, but I was really pleased with the performance overall.”

This meet is a chance for freshmen to get their feet wet in NCAA swimming competitions. Jorgensen was really excited with how freshman Asia Seidt performed.

“It was a great debut for her and we’re looking forward to see what she can do at the end of the year.” Jorgensen said. 

Seidt won the 100 backstroke, the 100 butterfly and the 200 individual medley races. Seidt enjoyed her first meet, but is happy to have it out of the way.

“I know a lot of our freshmen were pretty nervous going into it,” Seidt said. “Now that we have it out of the way we know what to expect.” 

Jorgensen was also pleased with how freshman Glen Brown performed. Brown won the 200 breaststroke, took second in the 50 freestyle and the 200 freestyle, and took third in the 200 IM.

“Glen was really good, I thought he was very competitive,” Jorgensen said.  “He is a really talented swimmer as well.”

Danielle Galyer won the 200 backstroke, an event where she is the reigning national champion. She is looking forward to the challenges she’ll face this year.

“It’s going to be really fun, there’s a lot of good competition throughout the country,” Galyer said. “We’re taking it one step at a time, March is pretty far away, one meet at a time.”

Another notable performance was Sean Gunn in winning the 100 freestyle, an event where he represented his home country of Zimbabwe at the Rio Olympic Games this past summer. 

Seidt swam the fourth fastest time in school history in the 100 backstroke. Seidt said this was her favorite event of the day.

In the 1000 freestyle, Drew Aviotti swam the ninth fastest time in school history in route to winning his race.

These were just some of the many performances that have fans excited for the upcoming swim season.

The Cats now have less than two weeks to prepare for their first competition against an SEC opponent, as they’ll travel to Auburn on October 12th.

“It’s going to be a really tough matchup,” Jorgensen said. “We’re going to have our hands full, but its fun to compete and fun to get on the road.”