Meagan Bernier wins CIS gold!

Fifth-year swimmer Meagan Bernier found the top of the podium at the 2015 CIS Swimming Championships to propel the Tigers to a fifth place team finish on the last day of competition.

February 21, 2015

The Tigers saved the best day for last. Following the plan of turning it up a little each day… the Tigers swam their hearts out and finished the 2015 CIS Swimming Championships with the best day of the competition.

At the end of the night, Tigers finished as the best 'non-centre' University on the women's side of the ledger with a 5th place finish. A finish that included a gold medal performance in the 800m freestyle by 5th year and graduate student Meagan Bernier! That just started the ball rolling as both men and women fed of the energy and produced higher finishes than last season in both categories. The women finished 5th overall for the second time in three years and the men finished 10th moving up one spot from last season. This is a great result from a team that turned over 13 new swimmers of a 32 swimmer roster!

"The results from both teams displayed that universities that are not supported by the 'Centre Model' can not only compete but challenge what is considered the only 'High Performance Path' put forth by Swimming Canada," exclaims head coach, Lance Cansdale. "I am so proud of my coaching staff, the student-athletes for the results and our athletic administration for believing in our potential! In the end, Dalhousie University displayed the capability of what a true student-athlete is capable of and that they can push towards the lead of Canadian Swimming."

Tigers Results:

Tony Liew 11th 50m breaststroke

Sean Berrigan 7th 50m breaststroke

Paige Crowell 11th 50m breaststroke

Phoebe Lenderyou 6th 200m backstroke

Gavin Dyke 13th 100m freestyle

Lucy MacLeod 16th 100m freestyle

Rachel Shin 10th 200m IM

Meagan Bernier 1st 800m freestyle

Alison Grant 8th 800m freestyle

Kat Webster 5th 800800m freestyle

Kyle Watson 6th 1500m freestyle (NS Rec)

Chris Reith 14th 1500m freestyle

Dal Women - Lenderyou, Crowell, Shin, Fraser 6th 4x100 Medley Relay (NS Rec)

Dal Men Berrigan, Liew, Dyke, Champion 12th 4x00 Medley Relay

RECAP DAY 3 (final day): Speedo CIS swimming championships

UBC complete sweep, T-Bird women four-peat as CIS champions

February 21, 2015

VICTORIA (CIS) – The University of British Columbia women successfully completed a four-peat, defending their national title, while their male counterparts also dominated to bring home a double banner as the 2015 Speedo CIS swimming championships wrapped up Saturday night at the Saanich Commonwealth Pool in Victoria.

COMPLETE RESULTS: http://english.cis-sic.ca/championships/swim/2015/files/sched_results

The Thunderbirds women finished with 581 points, ahead of a fearless Montreal contingent (544), to earn a CIS-leading 20^th national banner. Montreal won the 400 medley relay in 4:06.64 but it was not enough for the RSEQ champions. Last year's runners up, the Toronto Varsity Blues, finished third with 412 points.

"Sometimes you have those moments of adversity and we had some of that this weekend but they believed in themselves," said UBC head coach Steve Price, who was named coach of the year for the men's team for the first time in his career. "Entering the meet, we were down to 14 women's swimmers, and were pretty depleted and they just had to put points up where they could and at the end of the day, they did a great job."

The UBC men reclaimed the national championship banner, last won in 2012, with a 153-point margin over second-placed Toronto. The T-Birds finished with 737 points, while the Varsity Blues followed with 584 and Calgary took third with 365.5. The T-Birds capped Day 3 with three individual golds including rookie Yuri Kisil in the 100 freestyle, Jonathan Brown in the 200 individual medley and Keegan Zanatta in the 1500 freestyle.

Kisil was named male rookie of the year and was awarded the Sprinter's Cup for winning both the 50 and 100 freestyle. Toronto's Eli Wall took home swimmer of the year honours after topping the podium in the 200 and 100 breast.

The men's races were capped off with an incredible win by Alberta in the 400 medley relay in 3:44.48 ahead of the Thunderbirds who finished second in 3:44.55.

"It honestly started with us bringing a guy like Coleman Allen to the program," said Price who last guided the Thunderbirds to a men and women's national title sweep in 2012. "Every year after that, we added more and more guys. We keep attracting quality guys to the team. It was by design as we've been trying to build this thing for a couple of years. This was really satisfying because it was a few years in the making."

Calgary's Fiona Doyle took home female swimmer of the year honours after sweeping gold in the 50, 100 and 200 breast and helping the Dinos win a bronze in the 400 medley relay. On Day 3 Doyle also broke the CIS short-course Championship record in her preliminary 50-metre breaststroke swim, touching in at 30.70 to best UBC's Annamay Pierse who set the record in 2009 (30.71).

First-year Carabins swimmer Katerine Savard was rightfully crowned female rookie of the year after going perfect in every event to sweep the 200 freestyle and 50, 100 and 200 butterfly. The 2012 Olympian was also pivotal for Montreal, swimming to gold in all three relay events. Carabins head coach Pierre Lamy was named women's coach of the year as six of his swimmers were honoured as CIS First Team All-Canadians. To cap off the successful 2015 campaign for Montreal, Sandrine Mainville was honoured with the Sprinter's Cup for the second-straight year after winning both the 50 and 100 freestyle.

Toronto's Paige Schultz and Calgary's Bogdan Knezevic were both honoured as the Student-Athlete Community Service Award winners.

NOTES: Finals were contested in a 50-metre pool (long course) for the first time at this year's Speedo CIS championships, while the morning preliminaries remained short course races... If records were set in the preliminaries, they will be added to the CIS championship short-course record book.

INDIVIDUAL HONOURS

Women

Swimmer of the year: Fiona Doyle, Calgary

Rookie of the year: Katerine Savard, Montreal

Sprinter's Cup (single winner of both 50 and 100 free): Sandrine Mainville, Montreal

Coach of the year: Pierre Lamy, Montreal

Student-Athlete Community Service Award: Paige Schultz, Toronto

Men

Swimmer of the year: Eli Wall, Toronto

Rookie of the year: Yuri Kisil, UBC

Sprinter's Cup (single winner of both 50 and 100 free): Yuri Kisil, UBC

Coach of the year: Steve Price, UBC

Student-Athlete Community Service Award: Bogdan Knezevic, Calgary

NOTE (swimmers of the year): Female and male swimmers with the highest aggregate point total for his/her two best swims as based on Swim Canada's performance charts.

NOTE (All-Canadians): All gold medallists at the CIS championships - including relays - are first-team all-Canadians for the 2012-13 season. All silver medallists - who did not win a gold medal - are second-team all-Canadians.

FINAL TEAM STANDINGS

Women

1. UBC, 581 points

2. Montreal, 544

3. Toronto, 412

4. Calgary, 287

5. Dalhousie, 235

6. Laval, 230

7. Western, 208

8. Alberta, 142

9. McGill, 136

10. Ottawa, 113

11. Victoria, 94

12. McMaster, 85

13. Guelph, 80

14. UQTR, 53

15. Manitoba, 40

16. Sherbrooke, 36

17. Acadia, 35

17. UQAM, 35

19. Laurentian, 14

20. New Brunswick, 10

20. Regina, 10

20. Lethbridge, 10

23. Wilfrid Laurier, 4

23. Brock, 4

Men (Nelson C. Hart trophy)

1. UBC, 737

2. Toronto, 584

3. Calgary, 365.5

4. Alberta, 303

5. Western, 216

6. McMaster, 178

7. Laval, 158

8. Victoria, 127

9. Ottawa, 118

10. Dalhousie, 115.5

11. Montreal, 113

12. McGill, 84

13. Guelph, 83

14. Manitoba, 64

15. Sherbrooke, 44

16. Acadia, 43

17. Lethbridge, 36

18. Waterloo, 17

DAY 3 INDIVIDUAL MEDALLISTS (Saturday)

Women 800m Free

1. Meagan Bernier, Dalhousie, 9:01.17

2. Lisa van Breugel, Toronto, 9:01.42

3. Bridget Coley, Toronto, 9:01.56

Men 50m Breast

1. Konrad Bald, McMaster, 28.46

2. Nick Kostiuk, McMaster, 28.63

3. Sergey Holson, UBC, 28.79

W 50m Breast

1. Fiona Doyle, Calgary, 31.11

2. Tianna Rissling, Calgary, 31.88

3. Erin Stamp, UBC, 31.92

M 200m Back

1. Matthew Myers, Toronto, 2:02.92

2. Joe Byram, Alberta, 2:04.69

3. Karl Wolk, UBC, 2:05.19

W 200m Back

1. Geneviève Cantin, Laval, 2:12.51

2. Barbar Jardin, Montreal, 2:13.05

3. Erika Seltenreich-Hodgson, UBC, 2:14.85

M 100m Free

1. Yuri Kisil, UBC, 50.25

2. Evan Van Moerkerke, Guelph, 50.50

3. Stefan Milosevic, UBC, 50.54

W 100m Free

1. Sandrine Mainville, Montreal, 54.73

2. Caroline Lapierre-Lemire, Université de Trois-Rivières, 55.37

3. Ariane Mainville, Montreal, 55.98

M 200m IM

1. Jonathan Brown, UBC, 2:04.17

2. Hochan Ryu, Toronto, 2:04.67

3. David Riley, Toronto, 2:04.70

W 200m IM

1. Erika Seltenreich-Hodgson, UBC, 2:13.20

2. Kylie Masse, Toronto 2:14.60

3. Marie-Pier Couillard, Laval, 2:16.38

M 1500m Free

1. Keegan Zanatta, UBC, 15:36.06

2. William Brothers, UBC, 15:41.20

3. Jon McKay, Victoria, 15:42.73

W 4 x 100m Medley Relay

1. Montreal, 4:06.63

(Barbara Jardin, Marie-Sole Jean-Lachapelle, Katerine Savard, Sandrine Mainville)

2. Toronto, 4:13.11

(Kylie Masse, Vanessa Treasure, Sherry Patel, Paige Schultz)

3. Calgary, 4:13.26

(Chelsea Shaul, Fiona Doyle, Rachael Grothe, Amanda Reason)

M 4 x 100m Medley Relay

1. Alberta, 3:44.48

(Joe Byram, Nick Kostiuk, Josiah Binnema, Tom Krywitsky)

2. UBC, 3:44.55

(Marshal Parker, Sergey Holson, Coleman Allen, Yuri Kisil)

3. Toronto, 3:46.94

(Matthew Myers, Eli Wall, Matt Dans, Mitch Ferraro)

About Canadian Interuniversity Sport

Canadian Interuniversity Sport is the national governing body of university sport in Canada. Every year, over 11,500 student-athletes and 700 coaches from 56 universities and four regional associations vie for 21 national championships in 12 different sports. CIS also provides high performance international opportunities for Canadian student-athletes at Winter and Summer Universiades, as well as numerous world university championships. For further information, visit www.cis-sic.ca or follow us on:

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