Lopes head to WAC meet in Texas

Wednesday, February 26

Houston, Texas

10 a.m.

Grand Canyon

WAC Championships

2/25/2020 4:39:00 PM | Men's Swimming and Diving, Women's Swimming and Diving

Men's team defends conference championship

By: Sierra Smith

The Grand Canyon men's and women's swimming and diving teams will compete in Houston for the WAC Championships from Wednesday to Saturday at CRWC Natatorium.

The GCU men's swimming and diving team looks to defend the WAC championship that it won at last year's conference meet, when it defeated runner-up California Baptist by 70 points with Lopes head coach Steve Shaffer winning WAC Men's Coach of the Year.

In the WAC Pre-Championship Men's Swimming and Diving Coaches Poll, only two teams received first-place votes. UNLV was selected as the favorite with five first-place votes and 35 points while Air Force received two votes and 28 points. GCU and Wyoming tied for third place with 24 points each. California Baptist was chosen to place fifth with 18 points and CSU Bakersfield received 12 points to put it in sixth. Seattle U received six points to close out the voting.

Northern Arizona was picked as the favorite to win its seventh consecutive women's championship. NAU received four first-place votes and 45 points. California Baptist followed close behind with three first-place votes and 42 points. In third place, New Mexico State received one first-place vote and tallied 35 points. CSU Bakersfield received 29 points to put it in fourth while Northern Colorado is projected to finish fifth with 25 points. GCU received 23 points, along with Idaho, to tie for sixth place and Seattle U rounded out the poll with seven points.

WAC Pre-Championship Men's Swimming and Diving Coaches Poll

1. UNLV (5) 35
2. Air Force (2) 28
T3. Grand Canyon 24
T3. Wyoming 24
5. California Baptist 18
6. CSU Bakersfield 12
7. Seattle U 6

WAC Pre-Championship Women's Swimming and Diving Coaches Poll
1. Northern Arizona (4) 45
2. California Baptist (3) 42
3. New Mexico State (1) 33
4. CSU Bakersfield 29
5. Northern Colorado 25
T6. Grand Canyon 23
T6. Idaho 23
8. Seattle U 7

For the men, GCU sophomore Mazen Shoukri enters the meet with the fastest conference time in the 50-yard freestyle at 19.76 seconds. Sophomore Florent Janin follows with the second-fastest time (19.93). Shoukri also has the best finish in the 100 freestyle (43.41).

Lopes freshman Mikhail Lyubavskiy leads the WAC in the 1,000 freestyle (9:18.87) and holds the third-best time in the 1,650 freestyle (15:26.80) and 400 individual medley (3:54.70).

GCU leads in the 200 freestyle relay with a time of 1:19.04, and also has the second-fastest time in the 400 freestyle relay (2:55.81) and 800 freestyle relay (6:36.76).

For the women, Lopes sophomore Kyra Forrest leads the conference in the 200 backstroke (2:00.59) and junior Marina McInelly leads the WAC in the 100 breaststroke (1:02.63).

In the 50 breaststroke, GCU junior Alyssa Christianson has the second-best finish with a time of 29.42 seconds and also ranks second in the 200 breaststroke (2:16.00) and is third in the 100 breaststroke (1:02.91).

Lopes senior Talita Te Flan has the third-ranked time in the WAC in the 1,650 freestyle (17:11.38).

With a time of 54.58 seconds, freshman teammate Cecelia Mayer ranks third in the 100 butterfly.

All information regarding the WAC Championships can be found here.

Preliminary competition will begin at 9:30 a.m. (Phoenix time), with the finals beginning at 5 p.m. (Phoenix time) each day this week.

There will be video of diving and swimming prelims on the WAC's Facebook, with the finals being streamed on the WAC Digital Network.

For more on GCU swimming and diving, follow us on Twitter and Instagram at @GCU_Swimming.