Win the Super Bowl and the head coach gets doused in Gatorade. Win the Missouri Valley Conference Swimming and Diving Championships and the head coach gets thrown in the pool.

SIUC women’s swimming coach Mark Kluemper was soaking wet, no thanks to his team, as it celebrated its victory by tossing the MVC Women’s Swimming Coach of the Year into the pool Saturday night at the Recreation Center.

SIUC edged out favored Illinois State University 972-954 in a hard-fought battle. Following Illinois State was the University of Evansville with 614.5, the University of Northern Iowa with 401.5 and Bradley University with 150 points.

Advertisement

Kluemper said the meet was highly contested all weekend.

This was a complete and total team effort, Kluemper said. Illinois State gave us a great fight. We never had breathing room.

They (Saluki swimmers) proved they could get in a big meet and get a win. Some freshmen maybe didn’t know they could do this.

After the first day of action Thursday, the team only had a five-point lead, 281-276, over Illinois State.

Kluemper said the team swam strong enough to stay ahead and set up a solid showing for Friday and Saturday.

We were kind of like a pitcher that didn’t have his best stuff but did good enough to get the job done, Kluemper said.

Leading the way for the Saluki women was senior Kiki Sidiropoulou, who broke her own MVC record in the 500-meter freestyle with a time of 5 minutes and 3.84 seconds.

Advertisement*

Other Saluki victories were Beth Ann Erickson in the 100-meter butterfly (58.37), Melanie Williams in the 100-meter breaststroke (1:06.06), Kirsti Albertyn in the 200-meter freestyle (1:54.94) and Diana Roberts in the 200-meter individual medley (2:11.57).

The women’s 400-meter freestyle relay team finished second behind Illinois State, but Albertyn set an MVC record with a time of 52.71 in the first leg of the relay.

Senior diver Karla Gerzema captured MVC Diver of the Year honors after setting both the 1-meter and 3-meter MVC records.

In the 1-meter competition, Gerzema scored 411.30, and in the 3-meter competition, she broke her old record twice. In the preliminaries Saturday morning, she scored 475.53 and then outdid that with a score of 481.5 in the finals Saturday evening.

Gerzema said the title was a great finish in her final MVC championship meet.

I had the record last year, and I wasn’t sure I could do it again, Gerzema said. I’m happy because it is my senior year, and this was a good way to go out at home.

Kluemper was pleased that the team overcame some of its early season losses with the victory.

The fact we took a couple hard losses made them more hungry to come in and have a strong performance, Kluemper said.

The women’s swimming and diving team will next face action Jan. 17 against the University of Kansas in Carbondale.