ESU Swimming in PSAC Championships

CLARION - Senior Heather Clouser closed her East Stroudsburg University career with her best performance and her top conference finish as the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference Women's Swimming Championships ended Saturday at Clarion.

Clouser qualified for the finals of the 200-yard backstroke with a personal-best time of 2:11.92. She then finished sixth, her highest placing ever, in a time of 2:13.95.

The senior from Wyommising placed four straight years in the PSAC backstroke events, but her best previous finish had been ninth both last year and in the 100-yard backstroke Friday.

ESU freshman Natalie Weingartner placed in two events on the final day of the meet with a eighth in the 200-yard breaststroke in a school-record 2:33.93 and tenth in the 200 backstroke in 2:12.90. She had been seventh in the 100 backstroke.

Other ESU place-winners were Jamie Miller 10th in the 200 butterfly in 2:19.34 after going 2:18.10 in the preliminaries and Mikaela Thorne 12th in the 200 breaststroke in 2:46.04 after a best-ever 2:37.30 in the trials.

The Warriors' 400-yard freestyle relay team of Linzi Reese, Natalie Harbold, Clouser and Karen Scott was seventh in 3:46.68.

ESU finished sixth of 12 schools for the second straight year with 117 points. West Chester easily repeated as the team champion with 740 points ahead of host Clarion 389, Bloomsburg 272, Shippensburg 244 and Slippery Rock 127.

IUP 87, Millersville 76, Kutztown 66, Edinboro 47, Lock Haven 36 and Mansfield 7 rounded out the field.

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