BONGANI MALUNGA
Florida International University (FIU) swimming star Naomi Ruele has notched up yet another accolade in her impressive college career in America. Ruele was named the Conference-USA Swimmer of the Year for the year 2018, following her record setting performances in the C-USA tournament which took place last month.
FIU’s swimming team is named the Panthers and Ruele has proved to be one of the university’s decorated athletes in the past three years, she has been one of only a few swimmers in FIU to qualify for the prestigious NCAA Championships in the last two years.
Ruele was named the Swimmer of the Year last month, she was accompanied by three of her teammates who also grabbed awards in other categories but Ruele got the decisive accolade which demonstrated her dominance in the C-USA Championship this year.
She earned the accolade after winning seven gold medals at the tournament; she won three individual categories (50m and 100m freestyle and the 100m backstroke) as well as being part of the victorious FIU Panthers team than won the 400m free relay, 400m medley relay, 200m free relay and the 200m medley relay.
According to FIU, she also set a new school record (22.11s) during her 50m freestyle victory at the C-USA Championships. The young swimmer first won the award in 2016 during her second year in college, she set a school and conference record in the 2016 C-USA tournament with multiple wins in various categories.