Oct. 15, 2008
NORMAL, Ill. -
Illinois State swimming and diving swept the Missouri Valley Conference honors this week as junior Katelyn Prorok and sophomore Lauren Terzis received recognition for their performances in ISU's first home meet against St. Louis University and Northern Iowa last weekend. Prorok won her second-consecutive MVC Diver of the Week honor and Terzis was named MVC Swimmer of the Week for the first time in her career.
Terzis had a great weekend as she helped lead the Illinois State swimming and diving team to a first-place finish in the dual-meet against Northern Iowa and St. Louis. She captured three first-place finishes in her first meet as a Redbird. Terzis broke an Illinois State pool record and a personal-best time in the 1000-yard freestyle with a time of 10:21.42.She also recorded first-place times of 5:04.41 in the 500-yard freestyle and 53.93 in the 100-yard freestyle. Her times in the 1000-yard freestyle and 500-yard freestyle currently rank first in the Valley, while her time in the 100-yard freestyle time ranks second.
Head Coach Steve Paska felt Terzis' performance in the 1000-yard freestyle event was the highlight of the meet and was very pleased with how she performed overall in her first dual-meet.
"For Lauren Terzis to swim in her first home dual-meet against St. Louis University and Northern Iowa and win the 1000-, 100- and 500-yard free is a phenomenal feat," Paska said. "She broke the 22-year-old pool record and describing that event as exciting is an understatement. I believe in due time she will become faster and having her at Illinois State for the duration of her college career is going to be very exciting."
Prorok also had an excellent performance this past weekend, as she helped the Redbirds to victory by leading her team on the diving board. Prorok recorded a first-place finish on the one-meter board with a score of 252.37 and a second-place finish with a score of 253.50 on the three-meter board as the Redbirds faced St. Louis' solid diving team. Her one-meter score just missed the qualifying score for NCAA Zones. Currently, her scores on both the one-meter and three-meter are the top-scores in the Valley.
"The conference award is especially meaningful this week because of the solid competition we faced," said head diving coach Phil Hoffmann. "I was very happy with how Katelyn performed on the diving board. Her performance is a good lead into this week where we will compete against Western Illinois and the following week where we will face our top-competition in Evansville and Missouri State."
Terzis and Prorok will join the Redbirds as they travel to Western Illinois for a fourth-consecutive week of competition, Friday Oct. 17.
