Canton, OH. - The final day of the Mountain East Conference (MEC) / Great Midwest Athletic Conference (GMAC) Swimming & Diving Championships competed Saturday, with the Wheeling University Women's Swimming team looking to end the event strong. The Cardinals would end up adding two more All-MEC honors to their total, including their third MEC First Team All-MEC award of the tournament. They would finish the four day event at sixth overall in the field, and third among their MEC competitors, scoring 495.5 points across the four days of swimming.
The top performance on day four would once again come from freshman Giulia Liberti, who took on the Women's 200-Yard Breaststroke. She would swim in the third heat of the event in the preliminary swims, and qualified for the B Final putting together a time of 2:32.86. With an All GMAC A Final in the event, the B Final would feature some of the top swimmers from around the MEC, with five of the eight swimmers being from the conference. Liberti would end up beating lout all five of those swimmers, dropping over a second off her preliminary time with a 2:31.48. She would beat the next closest swimmer by .16 seconds, taking home the First Team All-MEC honor. It was her second First Team Honor in as many days, after she took home First Team All-MEC in the 100-Yard Breaststroke the day before. She was the only individual to win First Team Honors, and brought the event First Team honoree total to three for the program.
The other day four All-MEC honor would come in the relays, with all five Cardinal relays that swam winning All-Conference honors. This time, it was the Women's 400-Yard Freestyle Relay team, with Caitlin Oltman, Lacie Langmyer, Lydie Sprecher, and Grace Moorley taking the pool The Foursome would finish right around their normal seed time, swimming a 3:40.12, and finished sixth overall in the field. It was enough to earn the team Honorable Mention All-MEC honors, finishing four seconds behind Frostburg State from the second place spot. The fourth day would get started with the 1650 Freestyle and, although it wasn't separated into finals, the Cardinals did have won top 10 finisher in the event. It would ome in the form of Langmyer, who swam in the morning's second heat, and would finish eighth overall with a time of 18:27.00. She just missed out on a top three spot in the conference by 10 seconds, rounding out a strong week in the pool.
Following Langmyer was the Cardinal that swam in the evening heat of the event, senior Gabby Baiano. Baiano would finish two spots behind Langmyer, swimming a time of 18:50.62, rounding out her four-year swimming career with the Cardinals. After stretching things out to start the day, the sprinters would take the pool for the Women's 100 Yard Freestyle. Wheeling would have two swimmers in the B Final of the event, with Lydie Sprecher taking 15th overall to lead the way at 54.91 seconds. Finishing right behind her was her teammate Moorley, who took 16th at 55.31 to wrap up the B Final.Oltman would round out the event, swimming in the C Final, and put together a time of 55.52 to finish 23rd overall.
The 200-Yard Backstroke was up next and the Cardinals were loaded in the C Final, with Liv Moyer, Sofia Garcia, and Mikayla Smitley each taking the pool. Moyer would lead the group, taking second in the heat and 18th overall with a time of 2:21.19 to round out her college swimming career. Garcia would finish right behind her, swimming a time of 2:21.30, while Smitley took fifth in the heat and 21st overall with a time of 2:25.09. Garcia would come back in the 200 Breaststroke C Final to round out the effort, and took 24th overall with a time of 2:43.89 to round out the day.
The Wheeling University Women's Swimming team now heads into the offseason as they look to build on their success during the 2025-2026 season.
