Women's rise continues with culture, capability

Friday, October 6

Moscow, Idaho

Grand Canyon

Simon Fraser (B.C.)

Photo by: Nathan Peters

10/6/2023 10:57:00 AM | Women's Swimming and Diving, Paul Coro

GCU returns most swimmers from 4 conference championship relays

By: Paul Coro

As the Grand Canyon women's swimming and diving program aimed to become a conference contender in recent years, Lopes head coach Steve Schaffer put together a roster with an increasing depth of talent to get GCU there.

Meanwhile, the Lopes swimmers and divers did more than the water work to thrust the program into a position of narrowing the gap atop the WAC. With a culture to match the collaboration, GCU begins its season with an upward trajectory continuing.

"We've got a great bunch of leaders," Schaffer said. "The culture is right, and they're motivated from Day 1. They're cheering for each other in practice and getting after it. This group of kids has really clicked, and they're doing a fantastic job."

Coming off consecutive runner-up finishes at WAC Championships, the Lopes return swimmers representing 11 of the 16 spots on last season's four conference championship relays.

That group features the returning WAC Swimmer of the Year, junior Maria Brunlehner. A potential Olympian next year for Kenya, Brunlehner won the 200-yard individual medley, 100 breaststroke and 100 freestyle at last year's WAC Championships and helped the Lopes sweep the freestyle relay titles.

"She gets better every year," Schaffer said. "She's a terminator. The one thing that Maria does is when it times to race, she locks down. She knows when to push and how to take care of herself."

The Lopes' leadership goes beyond Brunlehner's excellence with senior Raphaela Nakashima, junior Lauren Hicks and sophomore Paula Martinez Moreno serving as captains.

Like Brunlehner, Naskashima and Martinez Moreno have chances to improve into NCAA Championships cut times with Brunhehner only being six-tenths of a second away in the 100 freestyle.

Nakashima was the WAC runner-up pushing Brunhehner in the WAC Championships' 100 breaststroke final last year, when the Brazilian finished only 15-hundredths of a second behind her.

Martinez Moreno, who is from Spain, also narrowly missed a WAC individual championship last year, coming within 14-hundredths of a second of the 100 butterfly winner. She won the 200 butterfly at the College Swimming and Diving Coaches Association of America National Invitational Championship, helping the GCU women to its best-ever finish (eight place).

GCU returns another WAC champion in junior Aleksandra Wegrzynowska, a Polish swimmer who won the 200 freestyle while also taking third in the 200 butterfly and fourth in the 500 freestyle.

"She's going to be banging on all cylinders this year," Schaffer said.

The prospects of closing the gap on defending champion Northern Arizona could come from other emerging swimmers, such as Marta Guasp Bauza of Spain.

"She was figuring things out last year, and she has already jumped ahead," Schaffer said. "She seems really motivate to do better this year. I think she's going to be a difference-maker in terms of adding good depth."

After swimming the backstroke on the medley relay that won the WAC, graduate Briana Rittenbach of North Dakota had her best preseason training and is poised to also make a run at NCAAs after being part of GCU's 200 medley relay conference championship. Junior Maria Chatzi of Greece is back after swimming on all three freestyle relays that won WAC gold last season.

The training by sophomore Elisa Corradi of Italy and freshman Vivi Criscione of Oregon projects well for the mid-distance events, along with sophomore Krisalyn Henderson of Georgia returning form a seventh-place conference finish in the 1,650 and helping the 800 freestyle relay WAC win. GCU also added Hailey Sears of Washington after her success with the campus' club swimming program last year.

Two seasons ago, GCU outperformed NAU in swimming but the Lumberjacks' dominance in diving prevailed. The Lopes hope to chip into that advantage with the return of junior Shiori Bak of Australia, who was the WAC runner-up in platform diving. She has reinforcements from fellow Aussie diver Lucinda Harrison and freshman Eden Evans of Colorado.

"We've been nipping at their heels," Schaffer said. "Any help we can get from the diving side is going to help us win a WAC championship."