McDowell, Hotchko Headed to NCAA Championships
St. Mary's City, Md. - Yesterday, the National Collegiate Athletic Association released the official psych sheet for the 2009 NCAA Division III Women's Swimming & Diving Championships and St. Mary's College of Maryland will have two representatives at this year's championships in senior Brie McDowell (Doylestown, Pa./Hatboro-Horsham) and junior Rachel Hotchko (Yakima, Wash./A.C. Davis). This marks the fourth consecutive season that the Seahawks will be competing in the NCAA championships.
This year's championships will be hosted by Macalester College at the University of Minnesota Aquatic Center in Minneapolis on March 18-21. For the first-time ever, the men's and women's swimming championships will be held at the same time.
The program's first-ever All-American, McDowell enters the championships seeded first in the 200 backstroke (2:00.92), third in the 100 backstroke (56.62), and fifth in the 200 individual medley (2:05.48). All three of McDowell's seed times are NCAA automatic qualifying (‘A') times set at the 2009 Capital Athletic Conference Championships where she was named the CAC Women's Swimmer-of-the-Year for the second time in her career after winning seven events and registering four NCAA ‘A' cuts.
McDowell first made an appearance in the 2007 NCAA Championships where she finished ninth in both the 100 and 200 back to earn two All-America citations. She currently holds 12 school records (8 individual, 4 relays).
This is also a repeat showing for Hotchko who earned a spot at last year's championships in the 100 butterfly. She enters this year's competition seeded 19th in the 100 fly with her seed time of 57.30, the school record. Hotchko currently holds six school records (2 individual, 4 relays).
Unfortunately, the 400 medley relay team (McDowell, Hotchko, Sofia Sokolove, and Eleanor Koerner) missed making the NCAAs by one spot as the selection committee took the top 12 Division III 400 medley relay times.
The Seahawks will depart for Minneapolis on Tuesday, March 17, which action beginning on Wednesday the 18th.
