Swimmers strive for fast times at First Chance

2/20/2026 9:40:00 PM

GAMBIER, Ohio -- Trying to beef up their squad and times for next month's NCAA Women's Swimming and Diving Championship, the Kenyon College Owls hosted the First Chance Invitational on Friday night. The meet went without teams scores, while individual swimmers and relay teams tried to hit, or better, Championship qualifying times.

Kenyon's best swim of the night came from first-year Kate Dunagan. She rang up a time of 2:02.65 in the 200-yard backstroke. Although that time cleared the NCAA 'B' cut, it was not Dunagan's best time of the season. Earlier in the year, she posted a 2:01.90. Later in the meet, Dunagan swam the 100-yard backstroke in 57.65, which just missed the 'B' cut, but still not her best of the season (56.33).

The Owls' only other 'B' time of the night came from the 200-yard medley relay team of Gwen Eisenbeis,, Kelsey Van Eldik, Maggie Grespin, and Kate Bogan. They finished in 1:42.11, which, again, cleared the 'B' standard, but was not the team's best of the season (1:40.29).

Just missing out on qualifying times were junior Norah Johnson and first-year Julia Mascarenhas. Johnson swam the 100-yard breaststroke in 1:04.32. That missed the standard of 1:04.12, but Johnson has a season-best time of 1:03.48. For Mascarenhas, a time of 1:04.34 in a time trial of the same event, also came up a bit short, but she can still fall back on a season-best of 1:04.04.

Members of the team will have one final chance to improve times tomorrow at home, during the Fast Chance Invitational, which gets underway at noon.

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