The Illinois State swimming and diving team travels to Carbondale, Ill., this weekend for the Missouri Valley Conference swimming and diving championships hosted by Southern Illinois University.
Illinois State was picked to take fourth in the swimming and diving prechampionship coaches poll, behind Southern Illinois, Evansville and Southwest Missouri State, which mirrors the 2001 championship results.
With the Redbirds heading into the championships with mutiple swimmers and divers carrying some of the best times in the conference, head coach
Steve Paska is confident with the opportunities they have to be successful.
Whats exciting about this meet is that anything can happen, said Paska. Our team is excited to compete this weekend. We train and compete, throughout the year for this single event and I believe were ready.
Paska added that the Valley meet this year will be one of the most competitive in recent years, so he is taking his time to decide where to place his swimmers in each event.
There are different options to look at to see where each person can score the best for our team, said Paska. I would guess we have about 80 percent of our team in the events they need to be in right now.
This should be the fastest meet in theValley, top to bottom, since we started the conference in 1996, added Paska. Every school in the Valley has potential to be the champs.
Leading the Redbirds in the swimming events will be senior Lindsay Crowder and junior Angie Rawlins. Crowder, who recently broke the Horton Pool record in the 100 meter freestyle with a 52.56, has the fastest time recorded in the event since Tina Hitons 52.63 in 1991. She was also recently named Valley Player Swimmer of the Week.
Rawlins, a transfer from the University of the Pacific, qualified for leads the Valley with her time of 1:05.36 in the 100 yard butterfly.
NCAA Zone Meet qualifier, freshman Terra Wisman, will lead the cast of Redbird divers on both the one-meter and three-meter board.
The preliminaries will begin on Thursday, Feb. 21, at 11 a.m. in the SIU Rec Center Pool.
