Panthers Win Several Events in Dual Defeat to Virginia

Saturday, October 20

Charlottesville, VA

DIVE: 9 AM, SWIM: 12 PM

Pitt

Virginia

Panthers Win Several Events in Dual Defeat to Virginia

10/20/2018 6:30:00 PM | Swimming & Diving

Full Results (PDF)

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va.—The Pitt swimming & diving teams combined for seven individual event victories in a competitive meet against Virginia's ranked teams on Saturday at the UVA Aquatic and Fitness Center.

After the majority of swimming races and diving events were decided by narrow margins, the Pitt women (1-3, 0-3 ACC) were defeated by No. 10 Virginia (5-2, 2-1 ACC) by a score of 172.5-122.5, while the Panthers' men's team (1-3, 0-3 ACC) also fell to the No. 15 Cavaliers (2-0, 1-0 ACC) by a margin of 180.5-114.5.

Winning events for the Panthers, junior Valerie Daigneault continued her perfect start to the 2018-19 season, earning victories in the 100 back (54.66), 200 back (1:57.07) and 200 IM (2:01.57). Daigneault is now 9-for-9 in placing first in her individual events through three meets.

Junior Sarah Giamber also earned a win for the Pitt women, dramatically winning the 1000 free by .02 seconds with an impressive time of 10:07.65.

Leading the Pitt men, junior Samy Helmbacher triumphed in the 200 free (1:37.86) and 200 IM (1:48.34), while sophomore Blaise Vera continued his strong start to the season by claiming top spot in the 50 free with a career-best time of 20.33.

"For our young team to compete with one of the top programs in the ACC like we did today is pretty remarkable," Pitt head coach John Hargis said. "I'm so proud of our student-athletes. We won some great races and lost some close races, too. In the end, those loses cost us a little bit. Those races that come down to the wire can change momentum in a meet, and they did today."

Hargis also highlighted the improvement in Pitt's recent performances head-to-head against the Cavaliers, who won the ACC women's title last season and took third in the league on the men's side.

"Two years ago, we came down to Virginia early in the season and really struggled," Hargis added. "Today, we proved that we're making significant progress as a program. We were fractions of seconds away from winning a few more races and scoring more team points that could've changed the meet. Again, I couldn't be more proud of our team and the progress we're making. It's exciting for the future."

Pitt diving coach Katie Hazelton also took several positives from Saturday's meet, including the performances of Krista Jones on 1-meter springboard (3rd, 264.68) and 5-meter platform (4th, 190.95).

"We saw some great things today from our divers," Hazelton said. "Krista is showing impressive consistency from meet to meet. We also saw some mental maturity and grit after some early setbacks today. The 5-meter platform showed great promise and debuted a few freshmen on platform. I'm excited to start taking their optional dives up to 10-meter next week."

After more impressive showings from Pitt freshmen divers Nick Garberina, Amy Read and Serena Buchwald, Coach Hazelton is happy with how her athletes have started the season and is looking ahead to more success at upcoming meets.

"With three dual meets in a row, it has been a great taste of what it takes to be successful at the top of the ACC," Hazelton added. "Now we will take some time to refine techniques and build our competition diving lists."

The Panthers are off next weekend before Pitt heads to Notre Dame for another challenging ACC meet against the Fighting Irish and Virginia Tech on Friday, Nov. 2 (diving at 5 p.m.) and Saturday, Nov. 3 (swimming at 10 a.m.).

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