BOSTON, Mass. - Courtney Griffith (Westminster, Md./Westminster) finished fourth in the 50 free to lead the Mount St. Mary's women's swimming team to a fifth-place standing after the first day of the Northeast Conference (NEC) Swimming & Diving Championships on Thursday.

Griffith finished fourth in the 50 free with a time of 24.07 to notch the best finish in program history at the NEC Championships. Maggie O'Connell Dubois had the previous best standing with a fifth-place finish in the 100 fly at the 2008-09 championships.

Freshman Cat Coppler (Enfield, Conn./Enrico Fermi) finished two spots behind Griffith in the 50 free with a time of 24.48. Fellow freshman Mollie Walsh (Havertown, Pa./Archbishop John Carroll) finished 16 in the 50 free with a time of 25.23.

The Mount recorded fifth-place finishes in the two relay events of the night. Coppler, Walsh, Patricia Yam (Placenta, Calif./Rosary) and Griffith teamed up to place fifth in the 200-free relay with a time of 1:37.96 while Yam, Molly Kristiniak (Oreland, Pa./Gwynedd-Mercy Academy), Walsh and Victoria Shaw (Malvern, Pa./Villa Maria Academy) placed fifth in the 400-medley relay with a time of 4:14.36.

Saint Francis (Pa.) leads the three-day event with a score of 183 while Central Connecticut State (157), Wagner (117), Bryant (101), the Mount (57), St. Francis (N.Y.) (33) and Sacred Heart (31) rounded out the seven-team field.

Mount St. Mary's returns to action at the second day of the NEC Swimming & Diving Championships on Friday. The events on the day will be the 200-medley relay, 400 IM, 100 fly, 200 free, 100 breast, 100 back and 800-free relay. Preliminaries start at 11 a.m. with the finals starting at 7 p.m.