Over the last few years, the Hillsdale College women's swimming and diving team has made waves at the conference level, in the G-MAC/MEC Championship meets.
In 2022-23, the Chargers took thing up a notch, with the strongest performance in program history at the NCAA DII Women's Swimming and Diving Championships in Indianapolis, Indiana in March.
For the first time in program history since moving from the NAIA to NCAA Division II in 1997, Hillsdale had multiple swimmers earn All-American honors in the NCAA DII national championship meet.
Two swimmers – sophomores Megan Clifford and Elise Mason – made the cut to represent the Chargers at the NCAA DII Championships by time and traveled to Indianapolis on March 7.
Clifford was seeded 16th in her first-ever national meet appearance, and used a massive personal best of over a second on her previous best-ever time in the 200 butterfly to make it out of the prelims and into the A finals of the event.
In the finals, another strong performance saw Clifford finish seventh in the nation to earn first-team All-American honors, becoming just the fifth NCAA DII All-American in program history, and the first since Anika Ellingson in the 100 breaststroke in 2019. Clifford's prelims time of 2:01.27 also broke Hillsdale's school record in the event, one she had already set earlier in the season.
The next day, one All-American for Hillsdale became two. Mason, competing for the second time at the NCAA DII Championships, had the swim of her life in the 1,650 freestyle, dropping nearly 12 full seconds off her previous best time in the event and becoming the first swimmer in Hillsdale College women's history to break the 17 minute mark. With that time of 16:59.27, Mason, who entered the meet seeded 25th, finished 12th in the nation in the event and earned honorable-mention All-American honors, becoming the first distance swimmer in program history to receive NCAA DII All-American honors.
Personal accomplishments for Clifford and Mason capped a solid season overall for the Chargers. Hillsdale had another strong showing in the G-MAC/MEC Championship meet, winning six individual titles. Mason defended her three titles from 2022 in the 500 freestyle, 1,000 freestyle and 1,650 freestyle, while senior Marie Taylor won the 50 freestyle crown for the second straight season and sophomore Joanna Burnham claimed the 400 individual medley title as well. The Chargers also won the 400 medley relay with a team of Burnham, Clifford, Taylor and junior Caroline Holmes.
In the team race, Hillsdale fought hard to hold onto their crown but came up just short to eventual champion Findlay, who pulled away from the Chargers on the final day of competition. All told, Hillsdale and Findlay have combined to win the last six G-MAC/MEC titles, with Hillsdale winning three titles and finishing runners-up three times.
Hillsdale bids farewell to a strong senior class of seven swimmers, led by multi-time G-MAC/MEC champion Marie Taylor and 2021 G-MAC Co-Swimmer of the year Leah Tunney. But with both Clifford and Mason returning, as well as several other major contributors from past title runs, Hillsdale has a strong foundation to build off of for future conference title challenges and national meet success.
Photo Courtesy of the NCAA