Gainesville, Fla. -- The Nova Southeastern men’s and women’s swim teams dove head first into their inaugural season at the All-Florida Invitational hosted by the University of Florida on Friday. The newly added Sharks competed well against a dominate NCAA Division I field, which included the host and 2010 Division I national champion Florida Gator women’s swimming and diving team.

“It was great to get in the water and finally compete today,” head coach Hollie Bonewit-Cron said. “I feel like we did a great job pushing through each of the events as a team. We need to work a little more on our precision around our walls, but overall we got faster in the finals by the end of the day.”

With one day of competition under their belt, the Sharks women’s team current stand in seventh place out of seven with 42 points, while the men’s team is fourth out of six with 132 points. Both Florida’s men’s and women’s teams lead their respective fields.

The Sharks opened the three-day invitational with the women’s 200-yard freestyle relay. Anchored by freshman Ashley Bransford (Santa Cruz, Aruba), NSU’s “A” relay Nicole Gaynor (So., Orlando, Fla.), Marissa Leonard (Fr., Overland Park, Kan.) and Ewa Jamborska (Jr., Katowice, Poland) finished 12th with 10 points. The Sharks’ “B” relay quartet of Ashley Aranda (Jr., Kenner, La.), Courtney Wilson (Fr., Ft. Myers, Fla.), Kristen Ghandour (Fr., South Neptune Beach, Fla.) and Kelley Yakymiw (Fr., Hollywood, Fla.) finished just behind with eight points.

In the men’s 200-yard free, NSU’s “A” relay team of Armin Hornikel (Jr., Goose Creek, S.C.), Jorge Ospina (Jr., Lazumillos, Venezuela), Josh Davis (Fr. Huron, S.D.) and Ash Dougan (Jr., Tewkesbury, England) picked up 24 points, which was good enough for seventh out of 10. NSU’s “B” relay Jim Shelley (Fr. Charlottesville, Va.), Cameron Pfahler (So., Neptune Beach, Fla.) Nathan Caldwell (Fr., Naples, Fla.) and William Bunge (Jr., Springfield, Mo.) finished ninth with 18 points.

The Sharks did not have any women prelim qualifiers for the 500-yard free race. However, three men qualified for the finals Friday evening. Ospina led with seven points and a 10th-place finish out of 15, while Jonas Grundstrom (Jr., Fagersta, Sweden) and John Michael Hayes (Fr., Jacksonville, Fla.) finished 11th and 12th respectively to pick up an additional 11 combined points for the team.

Aranda was the only women’s prelim qualifier in the 200-yard IM and picked up one point for the Sharks in the IM finals Friday night. Hornikel was one of three NSU men to set a qualifying run in the prelims and finished 10th in the finals earning seven points. Pfahler added five points with a 12th-place finish, while Hayes picked up four with his 13th place.

In the women’s 50-yard free, Gaynor finished 14th out of 16 earning three additional points for the women. Dougan added another seven points for the men with a 10th-place finish, while Ospina and Hornikel finished 12th and 13th respectively for a combined nine points to round out the day’s competition.

“Today was our short day for events, and I think we’ll continue to get better and faster throughout the weekend,” Bonewit-Cron said.

The Sharks will resume competition on Saturday, Oct. 2 at 9 am with a longer slate of events.