FORT MYERS, Fla. – The FGCU swimming & diving team (2-2, 2-0 CCSA) is set to hit the road this weekend, traveling to Lynchburg, Va. for the 2021 CCSA Conference Championship. The meet, which will be held at the Liberty Natatorium, will run from Monday, Feb. 15 through Wednesday, Feb. 17.
Each of the three days of competition will have a morning session, a diving session and an afternoon session. All morning sessions will begin at 10 a.m., the diving sessions will be held at 2 p.m. and the afternoon sessions will commence at 6 p.m. All of the action will be streamed online on the Big South Sports Network and the meet will be closed to fans.
Scoring
Each individual event will have three scored finals (A-B-C) with nine athletes each. All 27 of those athletes will score points for their respective teams.
Individual Event Scoring
Each event's champion will score 35 points for their team, while last place in the C Final will earn one point. Here's where everything in between ranks for point totals:
A Final: 35-31-30-29-28-27-26-25-24
B Final: 22-19-18-17-16-15-14-13-12
C Final: 10-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1
Relay Scoring
Only a team's A Relay will score in each of the relay events. Each of the nine teams in the CCSA will compete in the five different relays: the 200-yard medley relay, the 800-yard freestyle relay, the 400-yard medley relay, the 200-yard freestyle relay and the 400-yard freestyle relay. Here are the point totals for each scored relay:
70-62-60-58-56-54-52-50-48
History at the CCSA Championship
FGCU will enter this year's meet on the hunt for its 10th CCSA Championship title since the 2009 season. The Eagles are coming off back-to-back second-place finishes, as the Liberty Flames are on a two-year winning streak.
Last season, FGCU racked up 1,403 team points over the course of the four-day competition, collecting five gold medals, seven silver medals and a pair of bronze medals in the process. At the conclusion of that meet, both sophomore
Reese Wakefield (Guelph, Ontario/Bishop Macdonelle CHS) and diving coach
David Boyko picked up a pair of the championship's four superlative awards. Wakefield, who won the 3m board and placed second in the 1m event, was named Diver of the Year and Boyko was tabbed Co-Diving Coach of the Year.
Senior
Petra Halmai (Dombovar, Hungary/Lanczos Kornel Secondari Grammar School) led the Eagles during last year's championship, earning a pair of first-place finishes in both the 100- and 200-yard breaststroke events. Her swim in the 200 Breast (2:07.38) broke the conference record and put her at 10th in the nation. She was later named CCSA Swimmer of the Year for her efforts, while Wakefield was eventually tabbed CCSA Diver of the Year.
Each of the four individual gold medalists from last year returned to this year's squad and will be looking to defend their titles. In addition to Halmai and Wakefield, both junior
Wiktoria Czarnecka (Lublin, Poland/Liceum NR 10 W Lublinie) and sophomore
Julia Rodriguez (Gainesville, Fla./Buccholz HS) captured individual events, as they took home the 50 Free and the 100 Fly, respectively.
2020-21 Season Highlights
FGCU finished its regular season with an unblemished conference record, having taken down UNF twice. The Eagles' shortened 2020-21 schedule also saw the team pick up a first-place finish in the FGCU Invitational. After three days of competition, the Green & Blue's 1,420 team points bested both second-place FIU (994) and third-place Georgia Southern (712).
In addition to team success, many Eagles earned individual achievements throughout the season. Halmai, a CSCAA All-American from 2019-20, opened up the year with a record-breaking performance in the 100 Breast as her time of 59.89 shaved .12 seconds off of the previous mark.
For her efforts at the FGCU Invitational, she was named CCSA Swimmer of the Week (Nov. 24), alongside Wakefield, who was tabbed CCSA Diver of the Week. Wakefield was honored after qualifying for NCAA Zones on both the 1m and 3m boards during the event. In addition to Wakefield, both sophomores
Delaney Nelson (Cincinnati, Ohio/Ursuline Academy) and
Alyssa Schmidt (Winter Park, Fla./Winter Park HS) also posted NCAA Zone-qualifying scores.
Halmai was not the only Green & Blue swimmer to be honored by the CCSA this year, as sophomore
Anna Hogan (Louisville, Ky./Sacred Heart Academy) was named CCSA Co-Swimmer of the Week on Jan. 19. During the meets against Miami and UNF, Hogan scored points in every event that she competed in. After turning in a pair of top-four finishes against the Hurricanes, she won both the 100 Breast and the 200 Breast while competing against UNF and added a second-place finish in the 400 IM.
In the last week of the Eagles' regular season, Halmai was once again honored by the CCSA, collecting her sixth career Swimmer of the Week accolade. The senior, who still has a year of eligibility remaining, was tabbed after winning a team-best two events during the team's victory over UNF. That meet was preceded by a senior day ceremony, during which head coach
Dave Rollins and his staff honored the Hungarian native.
Along with the success that Halmai had while competing for FGCU this season, she also had a tremendous showing at the 2021 Hungarian National Championship. The Olympic hopeful became Hungary's national champion in the 100-meter breaststroke and finished second in both the 200- and 50-meter events. Her performance earned her a spot on the 2021 European Championship Team, as well as a provisional spot on the squad that will represent Hungary at the Tokyo Olympics.
2020-21 CCSA Weekly Honors for the Eagles
Nov. 24
CCSA Swimmer of the Week:
Petra Halmai
CCSA Diver of the Week:
Reese Wakefield
Jan. 19
CCSA Swimmer of the Week:
Anna Hogan
Feb. 2
CCSA Swimmer of the Week:
Petra Halmai
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HEAD COACH DAVE ROLLINS
Head coach Dave Rollins is only the second coach in program history. He was hired Sept. 1, 2016 and owns a 34-22-1 (.609) dual meet record, which includes a 13-2 (.857) mark against CCSA opponents, in his fourth season. Rollins guided FGCU to back-to-back CCSA titles (2017, 2018), as well as the program's fourth-straight title in 2018, marking the ninth championship in 10 years. In addition, he has been awarded CCSA Coach of the Year in two of his seasons at the helm. Previously, Rollins was the associate head men's swimming coach at The Ohio State University. Rollins brings over a decade of coaching experience to The Nest, which includes helping to develop Olympians, NCAA Champions and All-Americans, along with multiple conference champions. A native of Brockton, Mass., he was a standout collegiate swimmer in his own right and was inducted into the University of Arizona's Hall of Fame in 2017, as a nine-time NCAA All-American, national champion, school record holder and team captain.
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ABOUT FGCU
FGCU teams have combined to win an incredible 82 conference regular season and tournament titles in just 13 seasons at the Division I level. Additionally, in just nine seasons of D-I postseason eligibility, the Eagles have had a combined 38 teams or individuals compete in NCAA championships. Seven FGCU programs have earned a top-25 national ranking in their respective sport – including women's basketball (No. 24, 2019-20) and both men's soccer (2018, 2019) and women's soccer (2018) as three of the most recent. In 2016-17, the Green and Blue posted a department-best sixth-place finish in the DI-AAA Learfield Directors' Cup and top-100 showing nationally, ahead of several Power-5 and FBS institutions. In 2018-19, the Eagles had an ASUN and state of Florida best seven teams earn the NCAA's Public Recognition Award for their Academic Progress Rate (APR) in their sport and have had the highest percentage of teams so honored from these two groups over each of the past three years. FGCU also collectively earned a record 3.46 GPA in the classroom in the spring 2020 semester and has outperformed the general University undergraduate population for 22 consecutive semesters. The 2019 Fall and 2020 Spring semesters each saw another milestone reached as all 15 programs achieved a 3.0-or-higher team GPA. The Eagles also served an all-time high 7,200 volunteer hours in 2017 – being recognized as one of two runners-up for the inaugural NACDA Community Service Award presented by the Fiesta Bowl.
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