The women’s swimming and diving team defeated North Texas on Wednesday night in the University Recreation Center.”North Texas is a much-improved team,” head coach Richard Sybesma said. “They weren’t as easy a team as we thought they were going to be, but our girls fought hard and did a great job.”

The Frogs were led by freshman swimmers Natalie Melenric and Stephanie Futscher.

Melenric took first place in the 100-yard butterfly with a time of 58.51 seconds and swam as part of the first-place 400-yard freestyle relay.

Futscher took first place in the 200-yard butterfly with a time of 2:08.01.

“The freshmen have really stepped up and taken the place of the seniors that graduated last year,” said Keleigh Wentworth, senior butterfly, independent medley and freestyle swimmer. “They’re really showing that they’re here and are not to be overlooked.”

Christi Cannon, senior freestyle and independent medley swimmer, said her team was surprised at how well North Texas swam.

“They’ve gotten a lot better, and we didn’t really focus on them as much as we should have,” Cannon said.

Wentworth also said she thought her team didn’t prepare as much as it should have.

“We were not as ready for them as they were for us,” Wentworth said.

Twice during the meet Sybesma called his team together for a huddle.

“Basically, I told them that we’re better than them, but we weren’t performing that way,” Sybesma said. “I told them what to change, and they went out there and did that.”

Wentworth said Sybesma emphasized the need to be there for one another.

“He told us that, yes, it’s an individual sport, but we need to be there for our teammates and rally around each other to help turnaround the meet.”

Also at the meet were 14 swimmers from Incarnate Word who competed in several different events both with the Horned Frog and North Texas teams.

“They came here and sort of piggy-backed to get some experience,” Sybesma said. “For being such a new program, I thought they did a really good job.”

Cannon said she thought the North Texas meet would be good preparation for the Frogs as they head into conference meets.

“Tonight showed us there’s still a lot of work to be done and that we can’t get lazy,” Wentworth said. “We’re not ready yet, but we definitely will be.