Swimmers Compete This Weekend At Delta State Invitational
12/14/2009 12:00:00 AM | Swimming & Diving
Dec. 14, 2009
HOUSTON - With the University's final exams of the semester close to winding down, the Rice swimmers travel to Cleveland, Miss., to compete in the Delta State Invitational Saturday through Monday (Dec. 19-21). The Owls are joined in the three-day, six-team field by the University of Arkansas-Little Rock, the University of Tampa, the University of New Orleans, Incarnate Word, and meet host Delta State.
Rice head coach Seth Huston, now in his eighth year at the helm of the Owl swim team, said that the business of finals may be close to being completed but the task of racing and competing in one of the region's largest meets of the year is still ahead. The Delta State meet features no less than 18 events over the three days, including 13 individual races and five relays.
"Some (of the swimmers) have not yet finished (with their finals), but all-in-all they have done a very good job of training through the exam period," Huston said. "We have tried to keep the bar high in regards to continuing to maintain our mid-season level of work and intensity. This is a critical time of the season and the exams happen to fall right in the middle of it.
"Our goal is to have our best team-meet of the season this weekend," Huston continued. "Hopefully everyone will be catching back up on their rest, and with school behind us, we can focus solely on a great team performance. Our challenge with this meet will be to keep the team focused on the meet, and not the break. The Delta State Invitational will be our first out of state road trip for this group of athletes. We have taken teams before and they have gone really well.
"Stephanie Wei, Erin Mattson, Pam Zelnick, Angela Wo and Shelby Bottoms have had some really good practices lately," Huston added. "I have seen Nicole Delaloye making some great progress as of late. Alexandra Ernst was out earlier, but I think she is starting to get back to her old self."
The Rice swim team is 3-1 in dual meets this season. The full schedule for the Delta State Invitational is as follows.
Sat., Dec. 19
200 Freestyle Relay
500 Freestyle
200 Individual Medley
50 Freestyle
400 Medley Relay
Sun., Dec. 20
200 Medley Relay
400 Individual Medley
100 Butterfly
200 Freestyle
100 Breaststroke
100 Backstroke
800 Freestyle Relay
Mon., Dec. 21
1,650 Freestyle
200 Backstroke
100 Freestyle
200 Breaststroke
200 Butterfly
400 Freestyle Relay
Players Mentioned
