Radnor, PA - The Franciscan University Lady Barons took away both a loss and a victory in their double dual meet against Cabrini University (L: 161-89) and Bethany College (W: 148-81) on Saturday, December 8.
 
The meet began with a second-place finish in the 200-yard medley relay in which the squad of Colleen Farabaugh, Alicia Winters, Emily Reuwer, and Katheryn Cunningham finished with a time of 2:00.01, a mere .59 away from the school record of 1:59.58. However, the relay was followed by a school record set by Farabaugh in the 1000-yard freestyle; taking second place with a time of 11:43.27. Farabaugh now holds two out of the three distance freestyle records for Franciscan, setting the 500-yard freestyle record in the Lady Barons' meet against the Ursuline Arrows (12/1).
 
Following Farabaugh, freshman Abigail Robinson dove into fourth place in the 200-yard freestyle dropping nearly seven seconds for a time of 2:35.35. The Lady Barons took their first individual win of the meet in the 100-yard backstroke as Reuwer raced to first place in a time of 1:03.55, just beating her seed time of 1:03.56. Reuwer was joined in the backstroke by teammate and senior Bernadette DiMaria who rounded out the top-six with a time of 1:29.46.
 
The next win of the day came in the 100-yard breaststroke where Cunningham would just out touch Cabrini's Kelly Schuehler for a first-place time of 1:17.24 to Schuehler's 1:17.49.
After a break of events for the Lady Barons, junior Maris Bey finished the 50-yard freestyle with in second place (28.73), while freshman Olga Pierce took fifth (30.34), and sophomore Shannon Wieszczek rounded out the top-six at 30.87. Bey led Franciscan in the 100-yard freestyle taking fourth in a time of 1:08.41. Joining her was Robinson in fifth place (1:10.14) and Pierce in sixth (1:12.40).
 
The next event to feature the Lady Barons was the 200-yard breaststroke where Winters and Cunningham would race to first (2:45.92) and second (2:48.95) place respectively, while handily holding off the field with more than a five-second gap between Cunningham's second place and the third-place finisher.
 
This strong lead from the Lady Barons would remain for both the 500-yard freestyle, in which Farabaugh held off Cabrini's Tara McCloskey for first place in a time of 5:41.31, and in the 100-yard butterfly where Reuwer led the field from the first turn, finishing first in a time of 1:02.01. Joining Reuwer, Bey and sophomore Andrea Beganskas finished fourth (1:22.34) and fifth (1:33.50) respectively, with Beganskas cutting nearly six seconds off of her seed time of 1:39.10. Winters rounded out the final individual event with a strong second place finish in the 200-yard individual medley with a time of 2:33.75.
 
The final event of the day saw the return of the medley squad for the 200-yard freestyle relay. After coming close in the dual meet against Ursuline, the four women were aiming hard to take the school record, and this they did in spectacular fashion. Led off by Farabaugh (26.54), the Lady Barons were 2/10 behind Cabrini's lead time of 26.36; however, the tide would turn with a blazing swim from Reuwer who swam a personal best of 25.77 giving the Lady Barons a solid gap. Cunningham followed Reuwer with a split of 27.32, another personal best, and, just off the 200 IM, Winters anchored the winning relay with another personal best of 27.94. In a final time of 1:47.57, the relay team of Farabaugh, Reuwer, Cunningham and Winters broke the school record of 1:49.63 by 2.06 seconds. This time was set in 2017 by Cristina Aramyo, Nicole Marshall, Emily Wieszczek, and Elizabeth McNulty.
 
The Lady Barons will finish their fall semester training this coming Friday and will be aiming at January 12, 2019 as their next date of competition against Urbana University and Hanover College at Urbana.