LYNCHBURG, Va. – A couple of Eagles added to their expansive medal collection, Friday, on day three of the CCSA Championships as redshirt-senior
Petra Halmai (Dombovar, Hungary/Lanczos Kornel Secondari Grammar School) picked up the gold in the 100 breast while junior
Reese Wakefield (Guelph, Ontario, Canada/Bishop Macdonnelle CHS) picked up a bronze medal in the 1-meter diving competition. The Eagles also won the silver in the 800 free relay.
Overall, the Eagles sit in second place with 1164 points, only behind Liberty, who has 1479.5 points.
"Another big night by the Eagles," said head coach
Dave Rollins. "Congratulations to Petra for winning her fourth straight 100 breast title and for Reese on picking up another medal. Also, congrats to Lucija [Sulenta] who climbed up the FGCU record books with a strong morning session and even stronger evening session. We look forward to closing out the competition tomorrow and putting up more top times."
For Halmai, her win in the 100 breast was her 12th CCSA gold in her storied career and her 20th medal overall. In one of the closest finishes of the championships, she out-touched Mikaela Fullert of UNC Asheville by .02 seconds, winning with a time of 1:00.53. It is also the fourth straight year that Halmai has won gold in the 100 breast.
Wakefield also adds to her collection as she picked up her second medal of the 2022 Championships after winning gold on day one in the 3-meter diving competition. Tonight, she put up her best score of the season with 308.95 points, but it was not enough to win as she finished behind two divers from Liberty. The bronze medal is also the sixth medal of her career and has now medaled in every diving event of her CCSA career.
Junior
Delaney Nelson (Cincinnati, Ohio/Ursuline Academy) also had a solid showing on the 1-meter as she finished fourth with a score of 293.80, a new personal best.
The 800 free relay team of junior
Anna Hogan (Louisville, Ky./Dupont Manual HS), senior
Brittney Pike (Boerne, Texas/Boerne Samuel V. Champion/Arkansas), senior
Joely Merriman (Shawnee, Kan./Shawnee Mission North/Arizona State), and junior
Kaja Reinhardt (Herdecke, Germany/Helene-Lange-Gymnasium Dortmund) collected the third medal of the night for the Green and Blue as they took home the silver with a time of 7:26.72.
Although she didn't medal, junior
Lucija Sulenta (Zagreb, Croatia/Gimnazija I Ekonomska Skola Benedikta Kotruljevica) had a big day as well as she moved up the FGCU record books. In the 100 back prelims, she broke into the top 10 in FGCU history with a time of 54.92. She jumped up one more spot to ninth in the finals as she swam 54.82, finishing fourth in the race.
Stanings After Day 3
| 1 |
Liberty |
1,479.50 |
| 2 |
FGCU |
1,164 |
| 3 |
UNC Asheville |
1,064.50 |
| 4 |
Incarnate Word |
745 |
| 5 |
Campbell |
653.50 |
| 6 |
Georgia Southern |
616 |
| 7 |
Gardner-Webb |
448.50 |
| 8 |
North Florida |
409.50 |
| 9 |
Bellarmine |
315.50 |
The Eagles will wrap up the competition tomorrow as the prelims get started at 10 a.m. on the Big South Sports Network before the finals tomorrow night at 6 p.m. on ESPN3. Events include the 100 free, 200 back, 200 breast, 1650 free, and 400 free relay.
For complete coverage of FGCU swimming & diving, follow the Eagles on Twitter (@FGCU_WSwimDive), Instagram (@FGCU_WSwimDive) and online at
www.FGCUAthletics.com. You can also sign up to have news on FGCU swimming & diving or other programs delivered directly to your inbox by visiting
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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 35-26-1 (.573) dual meet record, which includes a 14-2 (.875) mark against CCSA opponents, in his sixth 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 before winning the 10th championship in program history in 2021. 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 85 conference regular season and tournament titles in just 14+ seasons at the Division I level. Additionally, in just nine seasons of D-I postseason eligibility, the Eagles have had a combined 42 teams or individuals compete in NCAA championships. Eight FGCU programs have earned a top-25 national ranking in their respective sport - including women's basketball (No. 21, 2020-21), beach volleyball (No. 20, 2021) 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 in their sport. FGCU also collectively earned a record 3.50 GPA in the classroom in the fall 2020 semester and has outperformed the general University undergraduate population for 24 consecutive semesters. The 2019 Fall, 2020 Spring, 2020 Fall, and 2021 Spring semesters each saw another milestone reached as all 15 programs achieved a 3.0-or-higher team GPA in each. 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.
