Girls in first after 2 days

The Wolfpack picked up a pair of first-place finishes on the second day of action at the ACC Championships as Julia Poole won the conference title in the 200-yard individual medley and NC State's women won the 200-yard freestyle relay Thursday evening at the Greensboro Aquatic Center.

After two days of action at the conference meet, the Wolfpack women stand in first place with 454 total points. NC State's podium count is at six, including three gold medals after the two wins Thursday and the Pack's victory in the 200-yard medley relay Wednesday.

Ten Wolfpack women reached the A final in the three individual events that were contested on Thursday.

"The goal for us this morning was to put a lot of people in the A final," said head coach Braden Holloway. "Walking away from the morning with 10 girls swimming in the A final was huge and led into a really great night for us. I was really happy with our performance today, and we've just got to come out tomorrow and start over like it's zero to zero."

Poole won her heat of the 200-yard individual medley during the morning prelims session and entered the evening final as the top-seeded swimmer in the event. The Wolfpack sophomore made an impressive comeback in the late stages of her race to win the ACC title in 1:55.13. Her time in the final was her best of the season.

"Winning an ACC title was one of Julia's goals coming into the season," said Holloway. "To have her finish first was an outstanding accomplishment. Having four of our women in that final was big for us."

Ky-lee Perry, Kylee Alons, Sirena Rowe and Sophie Hansson added a dominating win in the 200-yard freestyle relay to close out the second evening of action. Perry led off with the best 50-yard freestyle mark in program history and the fastest in the conference this season, a blistering 21.58 that gave NC State an early lead in the race. The Wolfpack women led by a body length for the majority of the race, touching the wall in record-setting time. Their 1:26.15 mark was an ACC record, meet record, pool record and program record.

"The 50 free put up a lot of points for us with two on the podium," said Holloway. "Ky-lee rebounded from being out touched in the 50 free final and came back and went even faster leading off our relay. That entire really was really fun to watch. We knew we could have a great race, and it was fast. It gives us a lot of momentum going into tomorrow."

In the 50-yard freestyle, Perry touched the wall in 21.69 for second place with her NCAA A cut time, and Alons earned the first ACC medal of her career with a 21.81 for third place. Rowe also raced in the A final and dropped time to 22.29 for seventh place.

Kate Moore rounded out the podium finishes for the Pack as she took home bronze in the 500-yard freestyle. Moore clocked the fastest 500 free time of her career, touching the wall in 4:39.10 to move to second in program history.

"Kate had an unbelievable swim in the 500 freestyle," Holloway said. "Her and her sister, Hannah, are now 1-2 in our program's history, which is cool to see."

Anna Jahns and Tamila Holub joined Moore in the 500-yard freestyle A final. Jahns won her heat in the morning prelims to earn a spot in the final, where she placed sixth in 4:43.59, and Holub clocked a 4:41.53 for seventh place in the final.

The stacked 400-yard individual medley final saw Hansson finish fourth in 1:56.81, and Lindsay Morrow (6th, 1:57.77) and Jessica Horomanski (7th, 1:59.54) also posted valuable points for the Pack in the A final.

The Pack will return to the pool on Friday for the third day of competition at the ACC Championships. Prelims are set for a 10 a.m. start, and the finals will be contested beginning at 6 p.m. Friday's finals session will once again be broadcast live on the ACC Network Extra.

https://gopack.com/news/2019/2/21/swimming-pack-adds-two-gold-medals-to-acc-championships-count.aspx