By Gregory Wagner

This past weekend, the men’s and women’s swimming and diving team’s shipped up to Boston to compete against the Boston University Terriers. After two weeks off, and coming off of a successful 3-0 start, the men were amply rested and prepared to take on the tough competition that the Terriers posed.

The Rams first win came in the men’s 1,000-yd freestyle with a victory from senior swimmer, Steve Sholdra, in a time of 9:43:31. Sholdra had another dominating day in the pool as he finished first in his two other races, the 200-yd butterfly and the 500-yd freestyle.

Sholdra was the only Fordham men’s swimmer to individually finish first in his respective race. In his 400-yd freestyle relay with Thomas Shetler, Thomas Gillespie and Liam Semple, the team was just outouched by Boston University’s four.

Yet despite the loss in the 400-yd freestyle, sophomore Liam Semple continued to show signs of extreme progress. Semple finished third in the 500-yd freestyle and was the first Fordham swimmer to finish in the 200-yd freestyle. He finished a very close second with a season-best-time of 48.06 seconds in the 100-yd freestyle.

After the race, Semple said that he was happy with his performance, although he expects to continue to improve throughout the remainder of the season.

“[I’m] hoping to break the team record in the 200-yd freestyle and get under 4.00 in the 400-yd individual medley and 4.28 in the 500-yd freestyle,” Semple said.

Despite the Rams’ performance, the Terriers defeated the Rams by a score of 190-107.

With regards to the overall team’s performance, Semple was not disappointed with the team’s loss.

“Boston University is really tough competition and we traveled a long way,” Semple said.

More than anything else, Liam is impressed by the performance of the freshman class.

“Our freshmen continue to contribute a lot to the team,” he said. “They’ve stepped up to fill in the holes left by last year’s seniors, which gives a lot to our team performance and morale.”

The women’s team found themselves with the same result, a 191-109 loss to the Terriers.

The women’s team was spearheaded by the efforts of swimmers junior Morgan Fairclough, senior Shannon Lulley and sophomore diver Wendy Espina-Esquivel, all three placing first in their individual events. Fairclough finished first in the 100-yd backstroke with a time of 58.11 seconds, and Lulley took first place in the 50-yd freestyle with a time of 24.25 seconds.

Espina-Esquivel continued to own the diving pool, as she broke away from the competition in both of her events. Espina-Esquivel finished first in the 1-m dive, scoring a 263.10, and finished first in the 3-m dive with a score of 241.20.

After the tough competition on both sides this past weekend, the Fordham Rams were not phased.

“From top to bottom we put up a lot of promising swims that leave us hopeful for when we taper at the end of the season,” Semple said.

The Fordham women’s swimming team (3-2) will continue its season this Friday as they host LIU-Post. The men’s swimming team (3-1) will travel to the Bucknell Invitational on Nov. 20.