Both the University of Toronto Varsity Blues women's and men's swimming teams claimed victory in a Saturday (Oct. 18) dual meet versus the McMaster Marauders inside the Athletic Centre - Varsity Pool.

The final score for the men saw the Blues finish on top 73-46, while the U of T women claimed the win with a final score of 74-49. The last time the Blues and Marauders met in dual meet action was 2017.

"Today was a re-kindling of a dual meet tradition of sorts," said Varsity Blues swimming head coach Byron MacDonald. "We simply let the meet slide away for many years so it's great we have been able to bring it back this year."

For the women, a pair of first-year swimmers in Julie Nolan-McCarthy from Halifax and Natalie Hocevar from Toronto also shined in their events with Nolan-McCarthy swimming a personal best in the 100m breaststroke and Hocevar posting the fastst time in the 200m freestyle. Another rookie, Abbi Bahler from Red Deer set a best time in her win in the 200 IM, while second-year standout Angel Yao of Vancouver also swam lifetime bests in both her butterfly wins. Fifth-year Gemma Norman (Calgary) and fourth-year Teagan Vander Leek (Edmonton) also picked up meet records and wins.

On the mens side, Ben Loewen (Toronto) continued his standout swims after racing at the FISU World University Games in Germany this summer, posting stellar times on Saturday en route to two butterfly golds. Nathan Thomas (Pointe-Claire) dominated the two breaststroke events, while Quinn Matteis (Chatham) easily posted th fastest times in both the 200m and 800m freestyle races. Toronto also saw solo gold for Carter Buck (Londnon) and Ben Winterborn (Kingston). Finally, rookie Elijah Daley (Bermuda) won gold in the 200 IM, also in a meet record.

"To be honest, the swimmers should not be swimming this fast right now—we are in real hard training and don't peak til the Winter", added MacDonald of the strong overall team performance. "As a coach, I have to figure out what happened. There is a common thread among the standout swims—they all swam full time deep into the summer and swam the national club championships in August. So they are simply way fitter than anyone expected them to be at this time."

Next on the docket for a number of Varsity Blues swimmers will be the World Aquatics Swimming World Cup, hosted this year at the Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre (TPASC) from Oct. 23-25. From there, U of T will host McGill in a dual meet on Sunday, Nov. 16.