Spring Break
Second-ranked women swimmers gear up for NCAAs
LUCAS ROGERS
Issue date: 3/19/09 Section: Sports
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The meet will be held in College Station, Texas, at Texas A&M University. Over the course of the next three days, the meet will hold preliminaries at noon, with finals at 8 p.m. each day.
The loaded underclassmen of the No. 2 Georgia women's swim team recently gained some helpful big meet experience at the fastest SEC Championships meet in history, at which they placed third. This experience will be pivotal in their run at this week's NCAA championships, already the fastest seeded meet in the history of the event.
"These freshman and sophomore classes are strong groups," head coach Jack Bauerle said. "If they can hold up and we can get great swims from those that are on the fringe - those that are not supposed to score - anything can happen."
The Lady Bulldogs have plenty of opportunity for scoring where unexpected, as they are one of only three teams to enter the meet with a roster filled to the maximum limit of 18 swimmers. Granted the roster is heavily weighted with 11 underclassmen of 18 swimmers comprise the NCAA team, the group is stacked with talent that includes two Olympians in Wendy Trott and Allison Schmitt.
"We are excited to be here, to be with a full squad and to be a part of the fastest meet in NCAA history," Bauerle said. "For us, it is a great feeling to at least be mentioned in the title hunt. There are two or three teams better than us on paper and the hardest challenge we have is depending on underclassmen that have been untested to this point but are still a really talented group."
The competition begins today at noon with the 200-yard freestyle relay, in which the Lady Bulldogs are currently seeded seventh in an event where only 1.27 seconds separates the top 8 teams.
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