Hoosiers hit the road for OSU Invitational

The IU swimming and diving team will head to Columbus, Ohio, to compete in the OSU Invitational Friday through Monday.

With the preliminaries beginning at 11 a.m. Friday, participants will compete in the 500 freestyle, 200 individual medley, 50 freestyle, 400 medley relay, men’s one-meter diving and women’s three-meter diving as part of the first day’s events. The finals for these races will start at 6 p.m.

On Saturday, the event lineup includes the 400 IM, 100 butterfly, 200 freestyle, 100 breaststroke, 100 backstroke, 200 medley relay, men’s three-meter diving and women’s one-meter diving. Preliminaries begin at 10 a.m., and finals start at 5 p.m.

For the Hoosiers’ final day of competition, the schedule includes the 200 backstroke, 100 freestyle, 200 breaststroke, 200 butterfly, 1,650 freestyle, 400 freestyle relay and platform diving with prelims beginning at 9 a.m. and finals starting at 3 p.m.

“The kids we are sending there are going to have to work really hard to get second place finishes, and that’s what I expect,” IU Coach Ray Looze said.

Coming off two victories against No. 23 Penn State and No. 9 Virginia, the Hoosier men are ranked No. 7 according to the latest College Swim Coaches Association of America top 25.

With their only losses coming against No. 1 Michigan and No. 4 Texas, the Hoosiers are currently 4-2 on the season.

Although the Hoosiers will face competitors including No. 5 Florida, No. 10 Ohio State, Wisconsin and North Carolina, Looze expects his swimmers to have seasonal best times and establish themselves within the Big Ten Conference.

In a most recent CSCAA poll, the IU women were ranked No. 14.

However, the team added a pair of losses to its season record after losing to No. 10 Virginia and Penn State.

While many top-placing swimmers on both the women’s and men’s side will be in Austin, Texas, competing in the USA Winter Swimming Nationals, Looze expects the remaining swimmers to come back from OSU with championship finals, A finals and B finals and second swims.

Brooklyn Snodgrass, Madeline Maher, Taylor O’Brien and Haley Lips will represent the freshman class at nationals, while sophomores Dorina Szekeres and Cynthia Pammett, juniors Cody Miller, Eric Ress, Bronwyn Pasloski and Lindsay Vrooman, along with seniors Jim Barbiere and Ashley Specht, are just a few of the leading point scorers to compete in Texas this
weekend.

Live results can be found at ohiostatebuckeyes.com/livestats/m-swim/.