BIRMINGHAM â€" Freshman Alli Crenshaw advanced to another championship final Friday night, and three other freshmen, Kelsey Gouge, Lauren Reynolds and Heather Burns, made their presence felt too. With their four rookies leading the way, the Moccasins jumped from eighth place to sixth place in the team standings with one day remaining at the NCAA Division II National Championships.
Crenshaw earned her spot in the 500 freestyle finals by finishing second in the preliminaries. Her time of 4:53.97 was only 0.42 seconds behind the morning leader, Anjali Shakya of Cal-San Diego. That made the freshman from Marietta, Georgia only the second Moccasin women’s swimmer to qualify for the final in three different individual events. Mary O’Sullivan got there in both the 100 and 200 backstroke, as well as the 200 freestyle during her senior year of 2011.
Crenshaw and Shakya each bettered their times Friday night in the finals, but it was Nova Southeastern’s Erin Black who won the title. Shakya ended up second, and Crenshaw was fourth with a time of 4:52.69. It gave Florida Southern another 15 points in the meet, and moved them up to seventh place in the early stages of Friday’s finals.
Gouge (Snellville, GA) also reached the championships of the 100 breaststroke, marking her second solo appearance in the finals this week. She’d qualified earlier in the 50 freestyle, and was also part of the 400 medley relay team. This time Gouge placed third in the 100 breaststroke, setting a new school record with her time of 1:02.72. She’d set the previous record too in last month’s conference championships. Gouge was a little over one second behind the winner, Mariya Chekanovych of Simon Fraser (BC), who set a meet record. Her points moved Florida Southern up one more spot in the race, and got them within eight of a top-five position.
Reynolds (St. Charles, IL), made it into the consolation finals of the 100 backstroke after picking up a total of eight backstroke wins during her rookie season. Friday night, she finished second in the consolation race in 55.91 seconds, the best time of the season for a Florida Southern swimmer in that event.
The Moccasins’ 800 freestyle relay team was in the last heat of the time finals for that event, and as such, had to wait until much later on Friday night to compete. When their heat began, the time to beat from earlier in the day was 7:32.20 by West Chester (PA). Competing head-to-head against the other top teams in the meet, the Moccasins swam a 7:32.37, and finished seventh with Crenshaw, Reynolds and Burns swimming the first three legs, and senior Stephanie Doran (Flowery Branch, GA) swimming the anchor on her third relay race of the meet.
 At the end of the night, Florida Southern had 160 points in the meet, putting the Moccasins just four behind fifth-place Long Island-C.W. Post. Drury (MO) continued to lead with 295½ points, followed by Wayne State (MI) with 276, and Cal-San Diego with 255½. Wingate (NC) was fourth with 199½, before LIU-C.W. Post completed the top-five.
