The University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams hosted their first home meet and defeated the UW-La Crosse Eagles.

The swim and dive meet took place at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 5, in the McPhee center pool.

According to Blugold Athletics, both the men’s and women’s teams continued their winning streaks for their third conference meet of the season. The women scored 153.5-146.5 and the men scored 215-85. 

Both the men’s and women’s swimming teams took first place in the 400-yard medley relay. The women’s time was 4:03.89 and the men’s time was 3:30.41. 

Quincy Kabe, a third-year accounting and management student and diver, said that UW-La Crosse and UW-Stevens Point are historically some of the most competitive teams that the swimming and diving team competes against. 

Kabe said overall, the team’s ideal goal was to beat UW-La Crosse on both the men’s and the women’s side of the swimming and diving team. 

“I think everyone has their own individual goals but as a team, we’re always just looking to do our best, it just looks a little bit different for everyone,” Kabe said.

Kabe said the swimming and diving team uses the smaller meets like this as an opportunity to get ready for bigger meets and try out new things to see what works best for the team as a whole.

“Each of these smaller meets just prepares us for our bigger meets at the end of the season, whether that’s the Rochester meet in December or the end of season meets like Conference and Nationals,” Kabe said.

Molly Sheehan, a second-year business administration student and sprinter, said the swim team’s main goal for this meet was to keep improving its times, techniques and how it races. 

“For every meet and every week, we have been working really hard in practice,” Sheehan said.

Second-year exercise science and kinesiology student and swimmer Elaine Proefrock said it was really exciting to win the meet because throughout the duration of the meet, the women’s teams were very close in points and the win came down to the last few races. 

“Knowing how close it was and how everyone really stepped up and did their jobs is really important and it shows how cohesive we are as a team,” Proefrock said. 

Proefrock said she felt the meet demonstrated how hard the team has been working this year and how much everyone supports each other in and out of the pool. 

“Besides everyone’s really good swims yesterday, everyone was always cheering for each other and pumping each other up,” Proefrock said. “It’s really important to see that as a team, we’re always there for each other.”

Proefrock said that the women’s swimming and diving team has only beaten UW-La Crosse a couple of  times in the past decade, so they were excited to win against the Eagles this season. 

The Blugolds’ next meet will be against St. Cloud State at 4 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 18, at home, in the McPhee center pool.

Visit the 2022-23 women’s swimming and diving schedule and the men’s schedule for more information about meet times and locations.

O’Brien can be reached at [email protected].