Scout Hawkins swimming the breaststroke against George Fox

PLU Sports Info

Added Depth to Boost Lutes in 2025-2026

By Mark Albanese, Director of Sports Communication

Bigger. Faster. Stronger. That is what the Pacific Lutheran University men’s and women’s swimming teams look to be as they get ready to open up the 2025-2026 season with an exhibition meet later today.

It’s an earlier start than usual for the Lutes who have a mid-October exhibition race against University of La Verne before opening its usual Northwest Conference dual meet slate on Nov. 1 on the road against George Fox University. The Lutes will swim six meets at home, including the NWC season finale against University of Puget Sound on Jan. 31 before competing at the 2025 NWC Championships at the King County Aquatic Center from Feb. 12-15 in Federal Way, Washington.

For Head Coach Andrew Lum, he’s finally finding his groove, building back up the team’s numbers and helping make both programs into contenders at the NWC Championships.

PLU swim cheering poolside at the 2025 NWC Championships

Everyone on the team has only known me as the head coach and we’re now really seeing how our recruiting has impacted our program. And you know it's still a story that's yet to unfold throughout this season, because we don't know what's out there in the conference and how our current team members will develop.

But I will say, if we're just talking on the growth of our team, like pure numbers, we've grown exponentially. This year on roster we will have 19 men and 21 women. So we went from a rag tag team of 18 to more than doubling that to 40 total now, which is super exciting.

Head Coach Andrew Lum

With the added depth, Lum will have to spend more time this year making decisions on who gets to swim for points and who will be an exhibition racer during the eight conference dual meets.

This is also my first year that I have to make decisions for a conference roster because you're only allowed to have 18 point scorers. So we're kind of in the weeds of who's earning their spot to be a scorer for our team and who's an exhibition swimmer. So it's exciting. You know, it's creating really healthy competition within our team.

I know I've talked about it year after year, but I do genuinely feel this could be when we really start pushing for that top four spot within the conference.

One of Lum’s strength over the four years is his ability to create a great team culture and retain student-athletes with virtually no roster turnover from a season ago aside from graduation.

“It's a testament towards our team culture. Something that we've always shared on day one is that you all belong. You've all been recruited to some degree. You all have a meaningful reason why you're here, and the team has done an excellent job of really highlighting the fact that everyone has a strength that they can lend to this program, and that's really allowed each person to be empowered and to shine, and to feel that they're being seen, not just because of what they put up on the scoreboard. So I feel like culture has been a huge part of that selling point for us and that's really helping to retain our returners. They're really curious and they're really excited to see how we can continue to fold in these newcomers, and how they can blend into our team culture.”

For the men, the Lutes will look to battle against the rest of the Washington schools that occupy the top of the NWC standings. Last year, Pacific Lutheran finished with a 3-5 dual meet record and finished sixth at the NWC Championships, scoring 274 points and owning an 83-point gap on seventh place George Fox University.

2025-2026 Men's Roster

It’s been an uphill battle on the men’s side because Whitworth has been so entrenched at the top, and you throw in Whitman and Puget Sound in there. But I feel that we have a lot of talent in this first year class and also feel very encouraged about our current returners as well, in terms of what we've seen with practices and their development so far.

Tyler Tanaka is one of two returning All-Conference performers from a season ago and a swimmer the Lutes will rely heavily on this winter.

“It’s amazing how extremely versatile Tyler is. And in terms of his work ethic, team leader, and academics, he’s one of the best. So you know, we're going to do everything in our playbook to see if we can get him to leave here as a Northwest Conference Champion in at least one event this year. That'd be really cool.”

Last year, Tanaka was runner-up in the 200-yard breaststroke at the NWC Championships and was eighth in the 400-yard individual medley. All told, between his individual and relay events, Tanaka was responsible for scoring 121 points towards the team’s point total at the season ending meet.

Christian Georgi made his conference debut with a bang last winter, earning Second Team All-Conference in a pair of events. Georgi was fifth in the 200-yard breaststroke and placed seventh in the 100-yard breaststroke. Georgi additionally won the B Final of the 200-yard backstroke at the conference meet.

“Christian Georgi lit up the stat sheet for us a lot last year as well. I do feel that we have some returners that I think will develop really well, like Elijah Vickery, Anthony James, and Hoskoo Amgalan, just to name a few. So we're really looking forward to seeing how they develop.”

Boosting PLU's ranks will be five newcomers that Head Coach Lum has high hopes for.

What I really love about the five newcomers is their versatility. I think we have a lot of utility in what they potentially swim and what they could potentially do.

One of those five is Mill Creek, Washington superstar Vyron Domingo who won the 100-yard backstroke at the WESCO 4A District Meet and was fifth in the 200-yard IM at the WIAA 4A Championships last winter.

Vyron is a gigantic get for us. He was our first commit in the class of 2026 and he's coming in already faster than three of our school records so that is an immediate impact. He's also really not that far off in both butterfly events either. So I think the tough thing for Vyron is what he decides to pare down to versus what we swim them in.

In addition to Domingo, the Lutes are excited avoid the addition of Matt Jones, Marshall Bataluna, Sebastian Arellano, and Ciaran Dewing. Jones joins PLU from nearby Olympia where he set a school record in the 100-yard breaststroke. Batalina hails from Honolulu, Hawaii where he helped Kalani High School to a pair of top five finishes at the state meet. Arellano comes to PLU from Arizona where he finished second at the state meet as a member of the medley relay team while Dewing was a four-year state qualifier at Cascade High School in Everett.

We've seen a lot of incredibly promising things from them. I would say Matt Jones I think is a sleeper. He literally can swim every event. You put him in an event, and he'll do well, curious to see how he develops, but I think right now, he's probably leaning more towards breaststroke and distance freestyle, which is ironically what Tyler has done for us the past few years. So I don't want to say he's a replacement, because no one's getting replaced, but it is really cool to see someone that has that same utility as Tyler in a first year.

Marshall Bataluna, he's got a lot of high ceiling, just because he doesn't have as much familiarity with the sport. Sebastian has literally a high ceiling, because he's six foot five. But man, that kid's got pure speed, so he will be a high impact player for us, in sprint backstroke and sprint free events, and then Cieran Dewing in distance freestyle. So we add a lot of depth to an event that we've in the past, haven't done as well. So they're all very, very high impact guys.

On the women’s side the Lutes look to improve on last season’s performance, finishing with a 4-4 dual meet record and placing sixth at the NWC Championships. Pacific Lutheran tallied 281 points at the 2025 championship meet, enjoying a 52-point advantage on seventh place George Fox.

2025-2026 Women's Roster

PLU returns three of its four All-Conference performers from a year ago, including a pair of First Team honorees in Emma Gassman and Riley Maher.

Maher was First Team All-League in two events last year while earning Second Team honors in two more events. The junior placed third overall in both the 200-yard individual medley and 400-yard individual medley at the NWC Championships while also placing third as a member of the 200-yard medley relay team and fifth in the 200-yard butterfly.

Gassman returns with similar credentials, earning First Team All-League after placing runner-up in the 200-yard backstroke while landing Second Team All-League in the 200-yard butterfly (fourth) and the 200-yard medley relay (third).

The third All-Conference Lute that’s returning is Scout Hawkins. The Colorado native earned Second Team All-League in four events, finishing fourth in the 1,640-yard freestyle, fifth in the 200-yard breaststroke, and seventh in the 400-yard individual medley while also competing on the 200-yard medley relay team that placed third.

Beyond the trio of returning All-Conference swimmers, Lum is excited about the leadership growth of returners Ellie Cutting, Ella Norby, and Michelle Owen.

In addition to the returners, Lum is looking forward to what the incoming recruiting class brings to the squad.

I mean, talk about an incredibly talented class that we're bringing in. I feel like we have a pretty decent amount of depth now in our women's roster.

Headlining the newcomers is Harper Canessa, Kei Nishikawa, and Julia Lorenzo. Canessa joins the Lutes from Sunset High School in Oregon while Nishikawa hails from Pearl City, Hawaii. Lorenzo comes from Kamiak High School in Washington where she placed eighth in the 100-yard butterfly at the 2024 WIAA 4A Championships. Canessa placed fourth at the OSAA 6A Championships in the 200-yard medley relay while Nishikawa was fifth in the 200-yard freestyle and ninth in the 500-yard freestyle at the HHSAA Championship meet.

All three are coming in with times in whatever event you ask them to do, that would be top eight at the conference level. All three of them are very likely going to be part of our relays this year at conference and throughout the season.

For Lum, the early exhibition with La Verne is a chance to set the tone on the pool deck in terms of the energy the team brings.

“We’re really excited, because it's an early start to our season where we get to establish how we are on the pool deck and what our presence will be when we compete, and how we grind. And it's a really good one, since we're doing some off events and some off distances. So we're not necessarily doing things we would traditionally do on the conference level, but it's a really good way for people to ease into the competition of things before, you know, we rip off the band aid and we start off with a tri meet at George Fox.”

2025-2026 Swimming Schedule