At senior day on Saturday, seniors Chris Baier, Kyle Begovich, Sam Duimovich, Jessica Ferguson, Emilie Schnarr and captain Anju Shimura were honored before the meet to commemorate their years of commitment to the team.

“It’s a little bittersweet,” Shimura said. “It’s nice to be done with dual meets, but I am going to miss it, too.”

The Triton women had consecutive multiple-team meets on Friday and Saturday, and fell to Hawaii 157-84. On Saturday, they fell to Wyoming 226-72 and San Diego State 207-86. The Triton men fell to Hawaii 150-88 and to Wyoming 147-96. On Saturday, the Tritons’ fate was little different, as they lost to Wyoming 182-118 and fell to Hawaii 206-94.

Despite consecutive losses, the Tritons had many strong performances, and began to settle into their final race slots before their biggest races of the season.

“We are using this as an opportunity to get ready for our conference championship, which is three-and-a-half days long, so it’s a good lead-up,” head coach Scott McGihon said. “We talk at length about how to prepare their bodies and how to recover emotionally and mentally.”

The Tritons have been switching around their lineup since their season resumed after winter break,, trying to find the best event for everyone to be racing in, but have now made their final adjustments.

“There’s a lot of sleep and a lot of recovery in between,” junior captain Michael Lorch said. “The first meet isn’t hard; the second one is the hard one.”

McGihon said the Tritons will need to prepare for the longer meets.

“Two meets in two days requires a large amount of conditioning,” McGihon said.

Junior Matt Herman claimed the first victory for the Tritons on Friday by winning the mile swim with a time of 15:56.70. The mile is an unusual swim to see at a dual meet, but Herman still pulled out the victory.

Freshman Emily Adamczyk also continued her streak of outstanding performances by winning the 200-yard breast stroke (2:22.37).

In one of the closest swims of the day, sophomore Olivia Martens just missed the victory in the 200 butterfly (2:08.25), falling by less than a tenth of a second. Both the men’s and women’s 400 freestyle relays emerged victorious at the end of the day.

Junior Alex Henley continued her streak with a victory both days, winning the 200 backstroke (2:02.79) with a dominating five-second lead over her closest opponent. She followed that up with a victory in the 400 individual medley on Saturday, with a pool-record time of 4:25.39.

Sophomore Shaun Stringer was another winner for the Tritons on Saturday, with a victory in the 200-yard butterfly (1:50.40), also a pool-record time.

The Tritons also had a couple of near misses on Saturday. Junior Blake Langland took second place in the 50 freestyle (20.93), which would have been a pool record, had he not lost by less than half a second to Hawaii. Freshman See Han Lee took an unfortunate third place in the 200 breast stroke (2:04.33), leading the race up until the last 50 yards.

But Lorch said close races will help later on.

“Being as close as we are, it helps when it comes to big meets,” Lorch said. “Cheering for everybody when you have a tough swim.”

The Tritons will spend the next three weeks training for conference championships, and still have time to rest before the meet.

“Monday, we’re going to come back and train pretty hard,” McGihon said. “We still have a good amount of training before conference championships.”

Readers can contact Tyler Nelson at [email protected]