Women's swimming opens season with convincing victory over Boston College

Coming into the winter, the women's swimming team had high hopes for the season.

It was ranked No. 25 in the preseason poll — the first time Princeton had been ranked coming into a season in over 20 years — and had won 23 straight dual meets.

After the weekend, that streak had been stretched to 24 with a 149-110 win over Boston College at DeNunzio Pool.

Princeton started out hot, winning the first nine events to jump out to an insurmountable lead before the Eagles could even get their feet wet.

Princeton took the first two places in the first event — the 800-yard freestyle relay — to start the meet and then junior Michelle Nielson took first in the 100 backstroke. Freshman Stephanie Hsiao then opened up her college career by taking home first place in the 100 breaststroke.

By the time Boston College's Michelle Lane took home first in the tenth event — the 200 breaststroke — Hsiao had two wins, senior Danielle Stramandi won the 1-meter diving competition, senior Val Kukla led Tigers into the top four spots in the 1000-yard freestyle and junior Molly Seto won the 50-yard freestyle, just edging sophomore Cara Goeller.

Princeton had taken the commanding lead and was cruising into the win in its first meet of the year. A late run by the Eagles made the score respectable, but the Tigers maintained control the entire afternoon.

Also winning events were junior Margaret Hirce in the 200 butterfly, Goeller in the 200 backstroke, freshman Nicole Somers in the 500 freestyle.