LA MIRADA, Calif. --- Up, up and up. That's the trajectory of this incredible Biola Swim & Dive program. The Eagles once again illustrated their tremendous potential on Saturday afternoon in a home dual meet vs. Concordia Irvine. 

The women took a 130-104 victory, while the men came up just short at 126-101. It was a vast improvement from last year's dual meet for both sides. Biola ended up winning the meet with a combined score of 231 edging CUI's 230. Last season Concordia Irvine won the meet 291-118. The men finished a whole 53 points better than last year and are primed to move ahead of CUI in 2020-21.

Despite all the excitement about the future, this day was also headlined by a celebration of the lineage of leadership within the program. It was senior day! Before the swimming began the team took time to honor seniors Kaylyn Schull, Bethany Harper, Andrew Benson and Raymond Kam. It was a packed house at Lansing Pool, all there to honor the work those four have put in over their years swimming at BU.

The day began with diving, where the Eagles featured one female and one male diver for the first time this season. Westin Dawe made his diving debut in the one-meter, doing all he could to bring in some extra points for the men. He carded an 83.40 to finish second-place.

Ashley Vitale represented BU on both boards and won the one-meter by a wide margin. Vitale earned a 202.65 to beat the second-place CUI swimmer by nearly 30 points. Vitale went second in the three-meter with a 173.80.

Liza Parahnevich had another dominant day for BU. Her wins in the 200-IM and 200-backstroke were by wide margins and highlighted Biola's 10 individual event wins throughout the afternoon. She had a 2:09.93 in the IM, winning by four seconds over CUI's Faith Silzel. She had a gap of two-and-a-half seconds in her other individual event, going 2:08.35 in the 200-backstroke.

The women's side got a ton of points in the 100-freestyle and the 500-freestyle, taking all of the top-3 spots in each event. Audrey Vermeulen won the 500-freestyle with a 5:24.21, followed by Kellynn Hayes (5:24.54) and Katelyn Harper (5:29.99). Kolya Vos, the reigning Biola Athlete of the Week, won the 100-freestyle (:53.79), followed by Kasidee Pascoe (:54.22) and Meredyth Rubie (:55.83).

Pascoe, Rubie and Vermeulen were all also on Biola's 200-freestyle relay team that took first place. That trio, along with Nicole Chang, went 1:41.86 to edge Concordia's top team by a half-second.

Biola won one other relay on the day, with the men taking first in the 400-medley relay with a 3:32.23. The Eagles took first and second in that race with the top team comprised by Tanner Smith, Colin Reeve, Raymond Kam and Patrick Waggoner.

The men's team got three individual wins, highlighted by a tight win from Clayton Owens in the 200-backstroke. Owens went 2:00.19 to win the race by just nine-hundredths of a second. Smith finished second in the race with a 2:00.28, while the third-place swimmer from CUI was hot on their tails with a 2:00.45.

Smith had a strong day to follow up last week's PCSC Swimmer of the Week honors. He won the 200-IM with a 1:59.60. The Eagles' other win came via Gabe Weber in the 1,000-freestyle. Weber won the event with a 9:54.64. Also significant in that event was Westin Dawe finishing fourth. In addition to diving, Dawe recorded top-5 marks in both the 500- and 1,000-freestyle.

Rounding out the Eagles' event wins were Anna Haaksma (200-breaststroke - 2:29.20) and Faith McAllister (200-butterfly - 2:14.06). It was both swimmers' second-fastest time of the 2019-20 season in their respective events. 

All that's left now for Biola is postseason swimming. The Eagles will compete in the Pacific Collegiate Swim & Dive Conference Championships at East LA College from Feb. 12-15. Biola will hope to use that event to qualify some swimmers for the NCAA Division II Championships (March 11-14).