Card looking for 29th consecutive Pac-10 title
The last time the Cardinal men’s swimming and diving team lost a Pac-10 Championship, they were still known as the Cardinals, the average movie ticket was $2.87 and Ronald Reagan had just been inaugurated for the first time. It has been 28 consecutive victories for swimming head coach Skip Kenney, diving coach Dr. Rick Schavone and the Stanford men, a streak that they will look to continue at this weekend’s conference championships.
The No. 3 Cardinal will have a rough go of it against No. 1 Arizona and No. 4 California. The Wildcats beat the Cardinal in a dual meet at Avery Aquatic Center on Jan. 23. On Feb. 20, the Cardinal edged out Cal by just four points.
Stanford has previously fended off strong challenges to its crown. Arizona won the national title in 2008, but could not best the Cardinal at Pac-10s. Generally, top swim teams will only peak for two meets all year: one during the season in order to get NCAA qualifying marks and then again for the NCAA meet. While the Cardinal is using Pac-10s as its opportunity to swim fast times, Arizona has already rested once this year and may decide, as it has in the past, to rest more for NCAAs than Pac-10s.
The Cardinal will also be faced with balancing its focus; the streak is important to the program, but NCAAs are still the most important meet of the year for any team.
“Obviously there is a bit of pressure from the 28-year streak, as no team wants to be the one to break it,” explained senior David Dunford. “However, our primary focus for the season is still on NCAAs.”
If Stanford is to pull off the upset and keep the streak alive, it will have to rely on its experience. Upperclassmen Eugene Godsoe, Alex Coville, Dunford and David Mosko will all be called upon for big production.
Godsoe is one of the nation’s top backstrokers and has also contributed in the butterfly and on freestyle relays. He is the defending Pac-10 champion in both the 100- and 200-yard backstroke.
Dunford and Coville are Stanford’s best sprinters. Though neither appears capable of challenging Nathan Adrian of Cal, one of the best sprinters in the country if not the world, each was a member of two Pac-10-winning relays last year and will look to match the feat.
Mosko is one of the Cardinal’s best distance and butterfly swimmers. He will most likely be called upon in the 200- and 500-yard freestyle and the 200-yard butterfly. Sophomore Bobby Bollier is the defending champion in the 200-yard butterfly, and will be joining Mosko in that race.
The Cardinal has been led this season by a trio of sophomore distance swimmers in Chad La Tourette, Michael Zoldos and Trevor Scheid. Against both Cal and Arizona, they swept at least one of the distance swims. La Tourette is the defending champion in the 1650-yard freestyle.
Unfortunately for the Cardinal, there are only two distance swims at major championships, the 500- and 1650-yard freestyle. Championship meets extend over three or more days and therefore include many more relays and sprint events than dual meets. As a result, a greater emphasis is placed on depth and sprint strength than in dual meets — for instance, four of the five relays are sprint relays.
“In a championship meet, swimmers are allowed to swim a maximum of three individual events and four relays,” Dunford explained. “This means that there is a larger emphasis on the sprint events, and the meets tend to be more demanding of sprinters.”
Though the swimming championships do not start until tonight, the diving portion of the meet was held this past weekend in Washington. Stanford was once again without senior All-American Dwight Dumais, who is out with a shoulder injury. Junior Brent Eichenseer shouldered the load for the Cardinal, taking third in the three-meter (382.00) and platform (391.85) and fourth in the one-meter (386.85).
Swimming competition begins tonight at 6 p.m. and ends on Saturday evening. The meet will take place in Long Beach, Calif.