Midway through their season with their cake half-baked and their future undecided, the USC men’s and women’s swim teams segmented the year with a spirited performance at the Texas Hall of Fame Swimming Invitational. The short-course meet featured seven teams from across the nation and offered the Trojans the chance to flex their strength in distance freestyle, an area USC has cornered in both of its teams. 

However, Austin, Texas, instead bore witness to the emergence of the Trojans’ medley and breaststroke domination. Though senior distancer Claire Tuggle pulled her weight after placing second in the 500 free and junior jack-of-all-trades Krzysztof Chmielewski held down third in the men’s 500, the meet belonged to the other strokes.

Both breaststroke races were some of USC’s best events, with four Trojan women placing in finals across the 100 and freshman Bell Brito finishing in seventh. Sophomore Junhao Chan continues to emerge as a leader in the stroke after taking home seventh in the men’s 100 and sixth in the 200 — followed closely in the latter by junior Sanberk Oktar, who finished seventh.

Oktar also led the Trojan men in the IM events, placing seventh in both the 200 and the 400. Senior Ashley McMillan dominated the women’s IM events, taking fifth in the 200 and placing fifth just behind senior Justina Kozan in the 400 IM. Kozan also finished fifth in the 500 free and third in the 200 butterfly, touching on each stroke in a powerhouse weekend performance.

However, the heroes of the weekend were juniors Minna Abraham and the Chmielewski twins, with the three of them each taking home event wins. 

Abraham won the 200 free with one of the fastest times in the nation so far this season; she continues to be one of the women’s most valuable contributors, with only graduate Nicole Maier coming close to her sprinting performance with some killer times of her own in the 50 and 100 free.

Both Chmielewski brothers were the top Trojan scorers of the meet, bringing in multiple top-eight finishes and total butterfly domination. Krzysztof Chmielewski took home the gold in the 200 fly, along with a finals-worthy swim in the 400 IM, while Michal Chmielewski won the 100 fly and locked down the second-fastest time in the event in USC swimming history.

Trojan diving leaves Uytengsu spotless

While the swimmers took on Texas, USC’s diving team unleashed a pristine performance back home, hosting the Trojan Diving Invitational at Uytengsu Aquatics Center from Thursday to Saturday. 11 teams competed, but the Trojans emerged as the winner of the entire meet after placing first in all six events.

Sophomore Kate Miller continued to pull out miraculous performances, winning all three of the women’s events to rank as the highest scorer of the meet. Miller renewed the now two-year tradition of the Trojans winning the 3-meter at the invitational, bouncing back from a lower-scoring prelim to take the gold in the final, though her platform score was some of her best work this season at a 630.90 score.

Graduate transfer Jenna Jagielski also brought her A-game, placing fourth in the 1-meter and third in the 3-meter. Her highest-scoring performance of the season thus far, Jagielski ranked as the fifth-highest overall scorer of the weekend.

Among the men, senior Laurent Gosselin-Paradis had his best performance this season after placing second in the 3-meter — behind only graduate Moritz Wesemann, who also won the 1-meter — and taking first in the men’s platform. USC dominated the platform event in a 1-2-3 sweep with Gosselin-Paradis on top, senior Robert Gref in second and freshman Luc Goertzen in third.

After incredible displays of aquatic prowess from the Trojan swim and dive teams, some respite is welcomed in the months leading to their next competitions. The divers will leap into the second half of the season with the Bruin Diving Invitational in Los Angeles from Jan. 9 to 11, while the swimmers will jump back in with a tri-meet at home against UC San Diego and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas on Jan. 9.