INDIANAPOLIS - In a thrilling come-from-behind victory, the Tufts University women's swimming & diving team's 800 freestyle relay won the national title on Friday night at the NCAA Division III Championship Meet.
Tufts' foursome of Katelin Isakoff, Abby Claus, Claire Brennan and Mary Hufziger put together a 7:19.17 winning time to edge Denison University's 7:19.25 time by a 0.08 margin.
It was the second night in a row that the Tufts women's team won an NCAA championship. Brennan was first in the 200 freestyle race on Thursday to become the first Tufts woman to ever win an NCAA swimming title. Tonight's accomplishment marks the first relay NCAA championship in Jumbo history.
Tufts was the #1 seed in tonight's 800 free relay with a 7:18.26 mark that won the conference championship. The Jumbos' seed time was over four seconds faster than Denison's #2 seed mark of 7:22.84. However, tonight it was the Big Red who were in the lead for most of the race.
For the the first 200 yards, Denison timed 1:49.83 and Tufts was at a 1:50.27 time. Through 400 yards, the Big Red margin grew to 3.46 seconds (3:38.55 to 3:42.01). The Jumbos began to come back in the third leg where Brennan swam a 1:48.85 split that gave Tufts a 5:30.86 mark through 600 yards compared to Denison's 5:28.95, a difference of 1.91 seconds. Then in the anchor leg, Hufziger was tremendous with a 1:48.31 split that launched Tufts to victory at the wall.
All four Jumbos receive All-American honors (top eight) for tonight's win.
The Jumbos also had a 15th-place finish by Lara Wujciak in the 200 butterfly this evening with a 2:03.42 time. Abby Miller was in the 100 breaststroke on Friday as well and her 1:07.48 time was 34th overall.
Tufts jumped into fifth place as a team with 156 total points at the meet through three days.
Tomorrow the Jumbos will have Hufziger, Brennan, Jillian Cudney, Mary Laurita and Cierra McCarty in the 100 freestyle; Claus in the 200 backstroke; Allison Cremer, Sahar Mumtaz and Katie Shelburne in the 1,650 freestyle and their 400 freestyle relay in action.
Head coach Adam Hoyt's Jumbos are attempting to improve upon the Tufts program's best-ever sixth place finish as a team from 1982.
Tufts student-athletes have now won four NCAA championships since last Saturday (Mar. 12), including tonight's 800 freestyle relay, Brennan's 200 freestyle victory on Thursday and NCAA Track & Field titles won last Saturday by Lia Rotti in the triple jump and Jaidyn Appel in the high jump.
