Fresh off of a pair of Capital Athletic Conference titles and a program-high 17th place finish at NCAA Championships, the University of Mary Washington swimming program has announced the addition of 10 new Eagles in the class of 2019. Both the men’s and women’s programs will have 5 members of the class of 2019, and the men will add one more with a transfer joining the class of 2018.
In the women’s class look for a huge addition of sprint freestyle talent to the pool as all five recruits swim the short freestyle races; most in conjunction with their primary events. Emily Adams will stick primarily to freestyle, but also will add great depth in the backstroke events and looks to have an immediate impact on relays. She will be joined by Helen Makriyianis and Michaela Miller who are both predominately sprint oriented with top times in freestyle, backstroke and butterfly. Kait Luncher is also a very strong flyer who will look to challenge for relay spots and extend her reach to the longer 200 butterfly. Taylor Mooney is the final addition to the class and comes in with backstroke times that will allow her to start thinking about CAC titles in her first year. With the graduation of an incredible senior class in 2015 these ladies will have a lot of expectation on them as the Eagles look to capture their 26th Capital Athletic Conference title in February and move on the NCAAs in March.
On the men’s side look for Michael Carrion and Josh McBryde in the freestyle and butterfly events, both of these swimmers have a ton of untapped potential and UMW looks to benefit from their breakthrough swims. Jeffrey Leckrone will be an immediate player in the breaststroke events and is another who has set himself up for some big swims in his first year. Jeremy Robertson is brings even more depth to the short stroke events; look for him in breaststroke, freestyle and butterfly. Ricardo Vasquez will join a talented group of IMers and has times that place him in the top of the conference in a number of events. The final new face will be transfer student-athlete Jacob Schroth in the class of 2018 who will join the amazing free/fly training crew and look to continue UMWs dominance in those events. In the 2015-2016 campaign the men are looking to take home another CAC championship and improve on their 17th place finish at NCAAs come March.
Head Coach Abby Brethauer says of her incoming class “We are so proud to have these young men and women joining the Eagle family and look forward to all that they will accomplish both in and out of the water. In addition to being stellar athletes who will come in and immediately play a role in the success of the team, they are also very talented students who over-achieve in the classroom as well. I am psyched to get them on campus and look forward to working with them to continue to build on our recent successes within the program.”