Wildcats Compete in First-Annual CCSA Championship this Weekend
2/20/2008 9:57:19 PM | Men's Swimming & Diving, Women's Swimming & Diving
Lauren Biggers -- Assistant SID
CCSA Tournament Homepage (Event Schedule, Live Stats, Etc.)
As the first-annual Coastal Collegiate Swimming Association championships get underway Thursday at the Huntersville Aquatic Center, the Davidson men's and women's swimming and diving teams are looking to make a splash in the new conference.
The teams have already combined for 11 new school records and nine CCSA Swimmer of the Week honors over the course of the regular season, and the women's team was ranked as highly as 10th by collegeswimming.com in its mid-major poll.
The Wildcat women's team in particular owes a large part of this season's success to its freshmen class. Ten strong, this year's freshmen were highly regarded, and they have more than lived up to expectations. The rookies have combined for four individual school records, three relay records and three CCSA Swimmer of the Week honors in their first go-round, but have even more to prove at this weekend's conference championships.
Leading the way is freshman Lindsey Martin, who set new school records in both the 50 (23:53) and 100 freestyles (50.82) and anchored a pair of record-breaking relays, the 200 and 400 freestyles. At the Nike Invitational at Kenyon College over the winter break, the two-time CCSA Swimmer of the Week became just the second swimmer in Davidson history to earn an NCAA championship B cut time, with her record-setting swim in the 100 free. This weekend, Martin's personal goals include swimming the automatic qualifying NCAA A cut time, but she also has championships in sight.
“Number one we want to win conference,” Martin said. “That has kind of been on our minds this whole season.”
To that end, classmate Anna Stringfield will be another pivotal player. Already this season, she set a new record in the 200 freestyle (1:52.93) and swam the leadoff leg for the record-setting 800 freestyle relay.
“Since the beginning of February, we have kind of been taking it easy and really concentrating and getting our heads in the game,” Stringfield said. “We are glad it is this week. I'm bursting with anticipation.”
With so much inexperience, the women's team could be at a disadvantage, but freshman Jessica Delgehausen, a member of two of the record-setting relays, sees it as an advantage.
“It's just like our first meet again,” Delgehausen said. “Because we don't really know what to expect. I think the more excited we get, the better we will do.”
With 10 freshmen on the roster, the 2007-08 women's team is nearly double its size of a year ago and able to field a full roster at this season's championships. Upon their arrival, they immediately changed the team dynamic, for the better.
“There are 10 of us, so we are almost a third of the team,” Martin said. “I like that personally. It's fun to break records right away. I think we want to do a lot of that too at conference. We had a really good meet at Kenyon over Christmas, so it would be nice to even beat those times since our season is coming to a close.”
Entering with personal times better than several school records, Martin, for one, began breaking records almost as soon as she stepped on campus. In her first collegiate meet, she broke the Davidson record in the 50 free that dated back to 1994 and bettered that time several times over, but admits to being unsure if she would do so right away.
“I didn't think I'd drop time immediately,” Martin said. “That's kind of a phobia of high school swimmers, that they'll go to college and never drop time again, but I was able to so that was really nice.”
Freshman Emily Castle, who set a new school record in the 100 fly, was pleasantly surprised by the quality among the quantity in the freshmen class.
“I expected to do well, but I didn't realize that all of the other freshmen were going to be so good,” Castle said. “We have an all freshmen relay. I didn't think that would happen at all.”
“Having 10 freshmen all specializing in different things, we have added a lot of depth,” Delgehausen agrees. “But we have raised the team's competitive level as well. We are all counting on each other instead of competing against each other, which I think is a really good thing.”
The competition amongst the freshmen naturally raises the level of competition among the upperclassmen as well.
“I think we have kind of inspired everyone to work harder,” Stringfield said. “Because I don't think anybody likes the idea of freshmen stealing their thunder.”
Sophomore Caitlin Sheetz, who swam with Martin, Stringfield and Delgehausen to set the new 800 freestyle relay record, agrees with that assessment.
“Anna and JD (Jessica) train distance with me, and I think it has been good having more people to train,” Sheetz said. “The dynamics that they have brought to the team has really helped motivate all of us and made us do a lot better this season than we have before.”
“Everybody is very positive about winning conference,” Sheetz continued. “We had a goal meeting and pretty much everybody's goal was make it back to top 16, top eight, to finals, just pretty much get as many people in the top heats as we can. If we do that, I think we have a pretty good chance.”
As the first-annual Coastal Collegiate Swimming Association championships get underway Thursday at the Huntersville Aquatic Center, the Davidson men's and women's swimming and diving teams are looking to make a splash in the new conference.
The teams have already combined for 11 new school records and nine CCSA Swimmer of the Week honors over the course of the regular season, and the women's team was ranked as highly as 10th by collegeswimming.com in its mid-major poll.
The Wildcat women's team in particular owes a large part of this season's success to its freshmen class. Ten strong, this year's freshmen were highly regarded, and they have more than lived up to expectations. The rookies have combined for four individual school records, three relay records and three CCSA Swimmer of the Week honors in their first go-round, but have even more to prove at this weekend's conference championships.
Leading the way is freshman Lindsey Martin, who set new school records in both the 50 (23:53) and 100 freestyles (50.82) and anchored a pair of record-breaking relays, the 200 and 400 freestyles. At the Nike Invitational at Kenyon College over the winter break, the two-time CCSA Swimmer of the Week became just the second swimmer in Davidson history to earn an NCAA championship B cut time, with her record-setting swim in the 100 free. This weekend, Martin's personal goals include swimming the automatic qualifying NCAA A cut time, but she also has championships in sight.
“Number one we want to win conference,” Martin said. “That has kind of been on our minds this whole season.”
To that end, classmate Anna Stringfield will be another pivotal player. Already this season, she set a new record in the 200 freestyle (1:52.93) and swam the leadoff leg for the record-setting 800 freestyle relay.
“Since the beginning of February, we have kind of been taking it easy and really concentrating and getting our heads in the game,” Stringfield said. “We are glad it is this week. I'm bursting with anticipation.”
With so much inexperience, the women's team could be at a disadvantage, but freshman Jessica Delgehausen, a member of two of the record-setting relays, sees it as an advantage.
“It's just like our first meet again,” Delgehausen said. “Because we don't really know what to expect. I think the more excited we get, the better we will do.”
With 10 freshmen on the roster, the 2007-08 women's team is nearly double its size of a year ago and able to field a full roster at this season's championships. Upon their arrival, they immediately changed the team dynamic, for the better.
“There are 10 of us, so we are almost a third of the team,” Martin said. “I like that personally. It's fun to break records right away. I think we want to do a lot of that too at conference. We had a really good meet at Kenyon over Christmas, so it would be nice to even beat those times since our season is coming to a close.”
Entering with personal times better than several school records, Martin, for one, began breaking records almost as soon as she stepped on campus. In her first collegiate meet, she broke the Davidson record in the 50 free that dated back to 1994 and bettered that time several times over, but admits to being unsure if she would do so right away.
“I didn't think I'd drop time immediately,” Martin said. “That's kind of a phobia of high school swimmers, that they'll go to college and never drop time again, but I was able to so that was really nice.”
Freshman Emily Castle, who set a new school record in the 100 fly, was pleasantly surprised by the quality among the quantity in the freshmen class.
“I expected to do well, but I didn't realize that all of the other freshmen were going to be so good,” Castle said. “We have an all freshmen relay. I didn't think that would happen at all.”
“Having 10 freshmen all specializing in different things, we have added a lot of depth,” Delgehausen agrees. “But we have raised the team's competitive level as well. We are all counting on each other instead of competing against each other, which I think is a really good thing.”
The competition amongst the freshmen naturally raises the level of competition among the upperclassmen as well.
“I think we have kind of inspired everyone to work harder,” Stringfield said. “Because I don't think anybody likes the idea of freshmen stealing their thunder.”
Sophomore Caitlin Sheetz, who swam with Martin, Stringfield and Delgehausen to set the new 800 freestyle relay record, agrees with that assessment.
“Anna and JD (Jessica) train distance with me, and I think it has been good having more people to train,” Sheetz said. “The dynamics that they have brought to the team has really helped motivate all of us and made us do a lot better this season than we have before.”
“Everybody is very positive about winning conference,” Sheetz continued. “We had a goal meeting and pretty much everybody's goal was make it back to top 16, top eight, to finals, just pretty much get as many people in the top heats as we can. If we do that, I think we have a pretty good chance.”
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