Cimera, Gallegos, Munkacsi-Nagy Earn MVC Weekly Honors

CARBONDALE, Ill. – Just one meet into the 2025-26 season and the weekly awards are already rolling in for Southern Illinois swim and dive. This week, Alex Cimera gained Missouri Valley Conference Men’s Swimmer of the Week, Liseska Gallegos Gutierrez was named the Women’s Swimmer of the Week, whereas Lívia Munkácsi-Nagy earned Women’s Freshman of the Week.

Cimera completed this previous weekend’s Missouri State meet with 28 factors, most amongst Saluki males and second most on the lads’s facet of the meet. He competed in six occasions, taking first in all however one. Individually, the senior went gold within the males’s 200-yard freestyle and two males’s 100-yard freestyle occasions. As a part of a relay crew, Cimera helped win the lads’s 400-yard medley relay and the lads’s 400-yard freestyle relay. This is Cimera’s first profession Swimmer of the Week honor from the MVC. 

“This is a much deserved accolade for Alex beginning his senior season,” says head coach Geoff Hanson. “He’s truly a great leader for our young men’s team, and we will rely on him all season in many different ways. Very happy for him.”

Gallegos was pivotal in SIU’s ladies’s crew’s 260.5-181.5 win over Missouri State. The sophomore stood atop the rostrum in each single occasion she participated in. In particular person occasions, Gallegos was first within the 200-yard backstroke and 100-yard backstroke. As for relay occasions, Gallegos was on the profitable squad within the 400-yard medley relay, 200-yard freestyle relay, 200-yard medley relay, and 400-yard freestyle relay. This is the reigning MVC Women’s Freshman of the Year’s first profession Swimmer of the Week award.

“Liseska is picking up right where she left off as the MVC Freshman of the Year last spring,” says Coach Hanson. “She’s got big goals this season and this first meet showed she is capable of competing at the highest level.”

 

Meanwhile, Munkacsi-Nagy had a unbelievable collegiate debut for the Salukis. The freshman out of Budapest, Hungary, competed in 4 particular person occasion, the place she took dwelling first within the 1000-yard freestyle, 400-yard IM, 500-yard freestyle, and was runner-up within the 200-yard backstroke. Munkacsi-Nagy additionally swam for SIU’s “A” crew within the 400-yard freestyle relay, which got here in first place. In the two-day meet, Munkacsi-Nagy completed with 31 factors, second most on the meet.

“Fantastic debut for Livia in her first college meet,” says Coach Hanson. “She has shown many good things early in this season of training, and we saw her potential in her first opportunity to compete.”

 

The trio is again in motion this Friday, Oct. 10, when Southern visits UIC for a 3 p.m. meet

 

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