University of Alaska Fairbanks Athletics

FAIRBANKS, Alaska – As temperatures begin to drop outside, the competition heats up indoors this weekend for the Alaska women's swimming team.
 
The Nanooks (0-0) kick off their regular season Friday and Saturday at home inside the Patty Center Pool with a two-day meet against Pacific Collegiate Swimming and Diving Conference foe Biola (0-0). The meet's first day on Friday begins at 6 p.m., and competition resumes on the meet's second day at noon on Saturday.
 
The last time these two teams met in a dual meet format was Oct. 20-21, 2006, in Fairbanks, where Biola won 109-93. Since then, the Nanooks have finished ahead of the Eagles in every PCSC championship meet – seven years straight and counting.
 
The Nanooks swam in their annual intersquad Blue-Gold Pentathlon meet on Oct.12, their lone competition so far this season. The underclassmen shined in the meet, gathering 14 combined top five finishes, including wins in all five individual events. The team set a total of 11 individual career bests at the meet.
 
Freshman Victoria Adams (Anchorage, Alaska/Accounting) headlined the Nanooks' youth movement by being named the Swimmer of the Meet in her first collegiate competition. Adams won three events and accumulated the lowest total time through all five individual events at 5 minutes, 11.82 seconds – more than 11 seconds better than the next-best total time.
 
Freshman Kathryn Pound (Pahiatua, New Zeland/Business Administration) also shined for the rookies, grabbing two victories at the Blue-Gold meet. She beat Adams by 0.17 seconds in the 100 yard freestyle and swam a leg on the Blue team's winning 200 medley relay team.
 
The upperclassmen had their day, too, though. Not to be outdone, junior Gabi Summers (Cheyenne, Wyo./Foreign Language) collected five top-four finishes and anchored the Blue team's winning 200 medley relay.
 
Senior captain Bente Heller (Hamburg, Germany/Psychology) kicked off her 2013-14 season by going 1-2 with Adams in back-to-back events and later going 2-3 with her in the 100 free behind Pound. Heller enters her final collegiate season this year as the defending NCAA Division II champion in the 100 backstroke.
 
Meet #1 – Biola at Alaska – Patty Center Pool, Friday, Oct. 25 (6 p.m.) & Saturday, Oct. 26 (Noon)
Important Links:     LIVE RESULTS
The Eagles (0-0) competed in the PCSC's Pentathlon events on Oct. 12, finishing seventh among eight of the conference's members. Christine Tixier accumulated the most points on the day for the Eagles, picking up 58 points in the individual medley pentathlon. Angela Kirschner also had a strong day, picking up 24 points to lead the Eagles in the freestyle pentathlon. She finished in the top 16 of all five events.
 
Biola finished seventh as a team at the NAIA National Championship meet last season, garnering three All-American awards and one national championship. The Eagles added four freshmen to this year's squad. Among them are Victoria Turner and Jennifer Walker. Turner, a backstroke swimmer, is the younger sister of Bethany Turner, a former breaststroker for the Eagles.